For those of you who may not have visited my blog before, this is a sister post to one I wrote a few months back called Investing in Your Journal & Your Practice: How to Start.

In a similar instructional fashion, I want to help guide you towards the practice using tarot or oracle cards as reflective journalIng guides. This is a super basic guide to simply get you started.

Cards as a Practical Tool
Cartomancy is the act of reading cards to predict the future. I personally believe
that he future is not static but, rather, malleable and that the use of cards can
help us shape it. Many people consider it to be a form of divination, a way to
connect to spirits and guides. Whether or not you believe in such metaphysical
capabilities (yet, lol), cards can be helpful at face-value for very practical uses.
Used alongside journaling, tarot and oracle cards can be powerful allies as we
seek to deepen our connection to our true ourselves through writing, reflecting
and self-discovery.

What I love most about using cards to guide journaling is that they keep my
writing creative and dynamic. This is due to the variety of cards available, and that they
encourage me to hone my abilities to intuit and trust my feelings. They also serve as gentle guides that ask me to reflect on elements in my life that I wouldn’t have organically considered, or even maybe avoided.

If you’re new to card reading, it may seem overwhelming to imagine how you
may interpret the words, symbols and images that may come up, let alone, turn
them into writing prompts and tools. I’ve been there, too.

I want to make it clear that this post is not about HOW TO READ CARDS in a
traditional or divinatory sense, though some of these techniques may be useful
for that too. This post is about using cards to aid your writing practice, spark
introspection and creativity and to strengthen your ability to listen to your intuitive inner voice.

To help ease you into it, here are some tips to consider as you’re beginning to
journal with cards:

Start with oracle cards
What are oracle cards? Oracle cards are cards with images and/or words that
typically don’t follow any traditional structure or framework. This often makes
them easier to interpret than, say, the numerical/elemental/historical symbolism in a traditional Tarot deck that, while still able to be intuitively read, do usually seem more difficult at first to connect to without a guidebook. Oracle decks commonly require little-to-no subject matter knowledge before working with them, making them pretty non-intimidating.

Get a deck aligns with you
Be it gothic imagery, watercolours, poetic words or affirmations that feel powerful:
There’s a deck for that. Whatever theme gets your brain juices flowing is what
you should consider using for this. If you feel enamored looking at it, you will
likely find it easier to connect with and use it on this intimate personal journey.

Consider, also, what you’re looking to get out of your journaling practice. If you’re looking to build up your confidence and creativity, you may be drawn to cards that are all love & light. However, if you’re looking to dig in to yourself, to unpack and unravel and get into some shadow-work, I encourage you to pick a deck that has at least some darker, deeper themed cards. You won’t reflect on a heavy topic if your cards never present the nudge to.

Try not to use a guidebook or look up meanings while journaling
Why? The reason I say this is because it is so easy to let guidebooks tell you
how you feel or what you’re going through, requiring little to no self reflection.
The purpose of journaling is to listen to and honor yourself wholly, and so I think
it’s best to simply let your mind & body do the talking. Not to mention, interrupting
your focus to search for a certain thing or stopping to research it is kind of anti-
flow, and can be distracting. Give yourself permission to set aside all that you’ve
read about right or wrong ways to read cards, or the “meanings“ of them. This
may sound counterproductive, but I want to encourage you to tell yourself that for
the purposes of this exercise you will not be card reading so much as you will be:
Looking for a reflection of yourself in it, listening for a voice to guide you into it, or
feeling a spark of creativity, however these may arise. What a card is intended to
mean vs what you may feel called to write about may be totally different, and
that’s ok. Outside of live-journaling time, I do encourage you to read through your
deck’s guidebook, learn about your the inspired imagery or words and about it’s
author/artist. Especially if you want to start divinatory card reading outside of this.

The Prompt or the Prompter?

If you’ve read Investing in Your Journal & Your Practice: How to Start , you’ll be
familiar with my recommendations for acquiring a journal and setting up the time
and space that I believe are helpful in beginning a powerful and magical journal
writing ritual practice. If you haven’t, and you’re new to journaling as whole, I
recommend checking that out first.

I’ll assume you’re caught up now. Let’s get started.

Card pulling can aid introspection and journal writing when used either as a
response to a prompt or as a prompt themselves. Both have immense value and
neither is better than the other.
Here’s a breakdown:

As responses to prompts
There are so many great sources for ready-made journal prompts. Pinterest is
one of my favourite and most expansive free sources for these (you may even
find some card spreads there you can use interchangeably). Alternatively, you
can make one up yourself. A prompt can be any question intended for self
reflection and to jump start your writing with intention and focus. This technique is
especially useful if you know what realm or issue you’d like to tackle, but you
may feel intimidated or reserved about creating the writing piece in response to
the given subject matter.

As prompts within themselves
In this technique, the card is the writing prompt. I like this practice when you’re
feeling more creative or are perhaps a little more comfortable with being
interpretive. With no prior focus in mind, using this method means that you will
write about whatever ideas the card sparks for you, exploring any number of
topics within it. Almost like answering questions Jeopary-style by seeing an
answer and reflecting on which aspect of your current self it may correspond to
or address.

Recommended Ritual

Once you’re in your safe and quiet space and allowed yourself a couple
minutes to feel settled and supported, you can begin. The following parts are
optional, but I believe to be highly useful:

Meditate
Though I know true meditation can be intimidating, even a few moments of
breathing to an ambient sound (or even listening to white noise) can help get
your mind ready to listen in to yourself.

Candle burning
I highly recommend lighting a candle if you’re in a space that allows for this. Even
a birthday candle will do. As you light the wick, imagine igniting your inner voice.
Allow your gaze to soften as you look at the flame. Feel at ease in the company
of yourself as you feel the warm glow inside of you. The element of fire
represents creativity, so let it inspire you for a moment.

Finally, Pull Some Cards!
Firstly, ensure you record the date somewhere on the page. You will likely want
to look back on what you wrote, and you may find that dates hold significance in
retrospect. At the very least, this can be a look way to reflect on progress.
Secondly, write either your chosen prompt or that you are pulling a card to spark
any reflection it has to offer. This can help as a frame of reference when referring
back. If you’ve chosen to go prompt-free and simple pull a card for inspiration,
write something like “I choose to write inspired thoughts from whichever card is
pulled”.

Shuffle your cards in any way that feels natural, stopping wherever feels right.
Pull whichever card you’re drawn to. It can be the one on the top, or the bottom,
or whichever card catches your eye as you fan them out. Trust this process.
The rest is up to your intuition! Try not to stifle it. I’ve written previously that the
beauty of your journal is that it is for your eyes only. No inspired thought is too
silly, dark or inappropriate. Look at the card and allow your eyes to settle on the
first element of the image that catches your eye. It could be the colour, shape,
word or even something as tiny as an image in the background. And it may
trigger a thought or memory that could even be totally unrelated, which is fine
(and the reason I urge you not to be influenced by a guidebook). The point is
simply to encourage thoughts and reflection! Put your pen to the paper and write
your thoughts as they come to you without worry about sentence flow or correct
grammar. Write as much as you can muster in your given time. I recommend
simply free-writing for 5-10 minutes per card or prompt if you can. If you
encounter any lulls in your writing, try to push through by describing something
about the card until more feelings arise.

You may choose to pull a weekly card which you can reflect use to prompt
thoughts on daily, or you may pull a different card(s) each time you sit down to
write. It’s totally up to you and there is no end to the ways In which you can let
card pulling inspire you. It is an excellent practice to get you in the flow of
expelling stifled or unacknowledged thoughts and lifting you into a consciousness
of things you may appreciate, feel negatively about, or simply hadn’t processed. I
believe it is also excellent practice for empowerment: Listening to, voicing and
honoring your true feelings, without censorship, into your journal can help you
feel more confident doing this aloud in your daily life.

Now, Keep Going!
I think this process gets more relaxed, fun and powerful as you make it a regular
habit. In my experience, you should feel your confidence and creativity grow with
time. It’s so interesting to go back through a year of card journaling to see what
came up, and when, with the hindsight of the present.

Do you have more tips for beginning a journal practice using cards? Have I
missed something? Let me know!