I am a Tarot reader and  I make no claim of special abilities. In other words, I rely on my hard gained knowledge of the cards to get my interpretation of a reading.

None the less, I have always admitted that each card has a lot of meanings.

The question and the surrounding cards help me decide which meaning applies to a particular reading.

A couple of weeks ago I was reflecting over how much the use of a deck influence a reading. In other words, the same card in the same combination, may be read differently by me depending on the deck I am using.

Why? I believe the artwork, the symbols, influence my interpretation.

What I know about the card does not change, but the symbols present in the card may lead me to go with one meaning over another.

I believe that is one of the many ways that intuition plays a role in a reading.

I  reflected on how sometimes I notice something in a card that I had not noticed earlier. Let me give you some examples. The river and waterfall in the Empress card. It has always been there, but I only started to notice it lately. Now I ask my-self how I could have missed it before.

Another one is the two of cups. I had never noticed how the man is reaching for the hand of the lady.

In the 7 of swords. Have you noticed how dangerously the sneaky guy is holding the swords by the blades? For years I had not!

Let’s take this a step farther.

Lately I have been wondering why the same symbols in a card will at time suggest something to me and at other times will not.

The 4 of cups.

In a reading I  noticed the 3 cups lined up in front of the man. After a moment, it occurred to me that 3 people were involved in the situation. The client confirmed it.

In another reading I noticed the two coins being juggled in the air in the 2 of Pentacles card. It told me the guy had two kids.

Why is it that a symbol will speak loudly one time and stay silent in another occasion? Again, I believe intuition is at work.

What do you think?

By the way, in all the examples mentioned above I was using the RWS deck.

The Fool card is from the Ancestral Path deck.