In the animistic world of the Ced Tradition Witchcraft, everything has a Spirit. This is also true of the Tarot. It is the Spirits that we develop relationships with, using what the old world called ‘the Sight’ or the ‘Gifts’. Formula readings of what the cards mean, or pulling from a book, will only get you so far. The composition of reality can’t be worked like a recipe, with ingredients coming together to bake a cake. And there are some key reasons for this, which for many aren’t even on the radar!

Having a deeper understanding into how a Tarot Deck works doesn’t mean it makes it more complex. It simplifies it by clearing the clutter of additional layers of imagery and help us focus in on the key elements. This focus can aid you in finding the best deck for you personally. Then you can forge a deep and personal connection with your deck that can tap into the tides of reality as related through you.

What are the key elements that served to bring the creation of the decks together? Why were those specific cards, that were included, chosen? When looking to identify the true nature of a Spirit I ask myself, what does that Spirit Serve? What is Served by its presence in the world? The causality of a Spirit’s presence is especially pertinent when we are talking about Fate. Fate itself is the function of Causality impacting the tides of spirit. With the Tarot, the purpose and nature of the Deck as a whole is to depict a complete and cohesive system of underlying Spirits, identities of roles, and key figures that make up our reality. This order of Spirit is what is called a Cosmology. And each religion, secular society, tribe or group has their own cosmology, which expresses itself through their values, beliefs, and principles.

Within the Ced Tradition we wanted to create our own Tarot Deck, which unlike other post-Rider Waite Decks, would not serve a Semitic Cosmology, hung upon the Kabbalistic Tree. Instead, we wanted a Deck that would be hung upon our own mythic cosmology as expressed in the Witch’s Compass of Ced. It’s understandable that many get confused when it comes to cosmology, because of the Christian confusion in the difference between Spirit and Physical reality, confusing the Mythic with the Historic! To address this confusion it is important to remember, when talking about the cosmology of a society or religion, that all elements, concepts, and even key figures are simply the identities of Spirits. How those root Spirits relate to other Spirits, the stories they tell, is what we are looking at when we read Myths, Fables, or any form of Cosmological tale. And though these Spirits and the tales they tell may carry mythic truths, that is distinctly different from literal historic reality.

The Tarot is a cosmology where each Tarot Card depicts a specific Spirit character. This can be a type of person, activity, emotion, concept, or situation. Anything that could exist within the context of a society or community is presented as a specific card. The truth of each card character is grasped by how coherently they relate to other elements, when placed in the original arrangement of their root cosmological order. Think of it as how an Alphabet is arranged into ABCDEF, etc. But then, when you pull these individual letters out of that order and rearrange them into words and sentences, they depict alternative qualities of reality. Even more so with a magical alphabet, where each letter glyph represents more than just a sound. It depicts a core principle, element, or quality within that community’s reality. Tarot cards are such a mythic alphabet of pictographic glyphs.

When you shuffle a deck you randomize the order, so a different arrangement can express a different context of reality. We do this to become informed about how the threads of Fate are presently ordered so we may make informed choices. Dame Fate has no agendas with any of us. She serves the harmony and evolution of creation. When we make choices that cause disruption to the tracks of harmony in Spirit, Dame Fate comes as the Mother of Causality responding to those choices, rearranging the threads or tracks of Spirit back into an overall harmony or path of evolution that serves creation as a whole. If we can identify the context, who, how or what has caused the impact to order, then we can make other choices that encourage Fate to resolve the conflict in a more beneficial manner to our desire.

Understanding that the Tarot is rooted in a Cosmology that is recognized and embraced by you, connects you to a language of Spirit that speaks to you! Then you must ask: what is the story each Card – Spirit – presents to you specifically? You can find inspiration in what the books present, or some other source. There are subsets of groups, within the Tarot, the Major Arcana and the Minor, the Court cards. And for me most importantly the numeric Spirit qualities and the planetary family groups. And a few more. Learning about these groups and their base qualities, nature, identity as a group, can help you to see the larger patterns within the Tarot. This helps the overall reading, and can be a faster, easier way to work the deck. In March, together with Goat, I will be presenting a short Tarot Series to delve into this approach, as we introduce the reading of the Tarot.

But the most important part in establishing yourself with your deck as family, is for you to take one card at a time and identify its story. If possible, think of each story as related to something within your own life. Think about a situation, or people if you can, even multiple versions of the story and associate those memories, ideas, sense of Spirit with the specific card before you. Think about how certain Spirits, when brought into connection with other Spirits, can present story scenarios, out of dynamics between those identities. For example, you are having a dinner party and you know if you put that person with this person, the result to be expected is anger, or rivalry, or mischief. When Spirit is entangled with other Spirits, that combination births new expressions of Spirit. This is how you flesh out the cosmology of the Deck, as it speaks to you. Taking the relationship, you have with your deck and your reality, deeper and more personal!

So rather than having to memorize somebody else’s associations with the cosmological Spirits of a Deck, build your own. What you need to recognize is that the Deck represents an order of Spirit that makes up your reality. Each card is an expression of a key Spirit within that reality. And it needs to be related to you and accessible to you. You and your Spirit are the threshold through which the Deck shall speak. The Deck gives language to a spiritual extension of you. As the tides and forces in reality shift and change, responding to the Spirits and events in your world, so too will the order and placement of the cards shift in accord. But the mediation of the Deck, the Rosetta Stone that will decipher the spread – that is you alone. So take the time to find clarity for yourself. What is the personal cosmology this deck presents to you? What does each card and each assembly say to you? Then you have a coherent Spirit partner that speaks your language and brings clarity to the invisible forces of Fate. That is something no book can deliver to you!