If you consider yourself to be a logical person, you might think that tarot is just some new age spiritual nonsense. It doesn’t make rational sense that random cards drawn from a deck could signify anything in your life.

Let’s reconsider this stance for a moment, though. Do you believe in talking therapies, counselling or in the benefit of analysing thought patterns so that we can break free of old “programming”? This system of cognitive behavioural therapy was hugely influenced by the work of Carl Jung. And Jung had looked into the role of the unconscious. The tarot also looks into the unconscious at archetypes that may be influencing us. Admittedly, the tarot uses spiritual language like energy and spirit to explain these influences. Physicists use terms like forces. But we are essentially talking about influences acting on us which we may be unaware of. If the unconscious is collective in some way, or maybe even universal, then it can give us insights from outside as well as inside our own mind, if we accept that Mind is larger than our individual small sense of self (or ego). Can we not, then, receive messages from outside our own limited awareness if we are open and receptive? I believe we can.

The tarot gives us insights into our own unconscious patterns and influences acting in our lives. Use it as a tool but don’t let it dictate your life. If used with a bit of discernment and acceptance that there is a margin of error with all things, the tarot can be a helpful guide for anyone who believes in something greater than their human existence.