Everyone emails me after a “tarot do amor” session. Not just my clients; people who just had a reading somewhere else. They all ask the same thing: “What does it really mean?” I can tell you why you’re confused, because I was stuck there for years. The cards are simple. It’s the readers, and honestly, it’s you, who turn it into a mess.
The Mess of Modern Tarot: It’s a Hodgepodge of Hopes
You see, most people come to a love reading looking for one of two things: a specific date for a commitment, or assurance that one specific person is “The One.” They want a contract, a guarantee. The minute a card pops up that doesn’t say “Happily Ever After,” the confusion starts. It’s like demanding a piece of code written in Python to do a job that only C++ can handle, and then blaming the Python code when the project explodes. It’s just not what the tool is for.
I started reading the way everyone else did. I’d pull The Lovers and say, “Oh, it’s a soulmate connection,” and I’d pull the 10 of Cups and say, “Wedding bells!”
This is the issue with the Love Tarot industrial complex. It tries to force everything into neat little buckets, but relationships are inherently messy. The cards are not designed to give you a step-by-step instruction manual for marriage. They are snapshots of energy, right now. They tell you:
- Are you thinking clearly? (Page of Swords)
- Are you carrying too much emotional baggage? (10 of Wands)
- Is something about to suddenly change? (The Tower)
But when a reader sees The Tower in a love reading, they panic and tell the client, “Oh no, a huge fight is coming!” When the 8 of Swords shows up, they say, “Your love life is trapped!” It’s all full of crap. The Tower is a quick shift. The 8 of Swords means you are the one holding the keys to your own cage. But people want drama, or they want easy answers, and professional readers are forced to give them what they think they want. It’s a huge, disjointed mess of misinterpretation.
The Moment I Threw Out the Rule Books
You want to know why I know this is the source of confusion? Because I lived it. I was the client. This was years ago, right after a seriously bad breakup where I just could not let go. I was stuck on this guy, checking his social media, driving myself crazy. I was desperate for proof that we were going to get back together, or that my next boyfriend was going to fix all my problems.
I was dumping money into readings. Hundreds, maybe thousands, in less than a year. I got readings from every big-shot on YouTube and every cheap local reader I could find. And they kept telling me lovely, vague things. “He’s still thinking of you.” “Love is on its way.” All the stuff that kept me hooked like a fish on the line.
I distinctly remember one night. I was broke. Literally $12 in my bank account. I was sitting on the floor, surrounded by candles and crystals, waiting for an email reading I had just paid too much for. I felt sick, completely drained. My son was three months old, and I was supposed to be figuring out rent, but I was fixated on this useless reading.
The email landed. It was flowery, but the core message was that I needed to “release what no longer served me.” I felt furious. I stood up, walked over to my shelf, and grabbed my deck. I threw all the books on the floor. I just sat down and pulled three cards for myself: Where am I now? What do I need to know? What’s the next step?
The cards were brutal. 8 of Swords, 3 of Swords, 9 of Wands.
My Practice Now: Just Look At the Damn Picture
I stopped reading the complicated interpretations. I just stared at the pictures, like the stupid child I was acting like. The 8 of Swords—the woman is blindfolded, but the swords are stuck in the ground far away from her. She could have walked out at any time. The 3 of Swords—a heart with three swords stuck in it. Pain. Clear, simple pain. The 9 of Wands—someone leaning on a stick, wounded, looking over a wall of nine other sticks, exhausted but not giving up.
I realized the message wasn’t some complex cosmic forecast. It was yelling at me: “You are hurting yourself. You are in pain. You are exhausted, but you still have a little fight left.” It wasn’t about the ex; it was about my current state of mind. All those readings I paid for were full of crap because they missed the simple, brutal truth right there in the images.
My practice changed that night. I stopped looking at the card names and the “big books.” I started just seeing the image and the number. That’s it. Simple energy.
I realized the confusion people feel comes when they try to put a complex, multi-year human relationship into the simple energy of a cardboard picture. The card doesn’t lie. It just tells you where you are standing right now. If you’re confused, you’re asking the wrong question, or you’re refusing to look at the simple image the card is showing you. It’s that simple. Get out of your head, and just look at the damn picture on the card.
