Cards with Many Faces
Cards with Many Faces
Using Tarot Cards to Inspire your Creativity
I’ve been working on putting the finishing touches on my newest workshop for writers and I have to admit that while I love all of the workshops I’ve put together, this one definitely takes the cake for how fun it has been. Because I’m a visual learner (as many people are), I decided to have an accompanying “example” for each exercise I ask my students to do. In doing so, I’ve come up with a shit ton (actual amount) of new ideas for stories, articles, etc. In fact, I enjoyed one particular exercise so much, I thought I’d share it with you today. Before we get to the exercise though, I want to explain why I love working with Tarot cards for creative projects like this because I’ve heard a lot of the same “worries” from potential students who say, “but I don’t know anything about Tarot cards!”
As you’ll see in the exercise below, using Tarot for creativity doesn’t require you to know anything about it. Will having a background in Tarot help you see things differently? Absolutely. But you can get just as much information and inspiration from them going in without a clue of what the cards mean. What this exercise will ultimately show you is that you can gain insight, inspiration, and curiosity from the simple acts of observing and questioning. The exercises in my workshop, including this one, are based around the principle that we are inherently intuitive and seek to make meaning of things. That’s one of the beautiful parts of using the cards — your imagination will automatically start to make meaning from the images you see, regardless if they’re what the card means or not. That’s a good thing!
I can promise you this — if you’re willing to have an open mind and a curious imagination, you will find use in this exercise. You may even come up with your next big idea. You just have to be willing to try.
The Card With Many Faces Exercise
For this exercise, I’ll be using three Tarot decks. You can follow along using the ones in this example, or pull from your own decks if you are a collector or card reader yourself.
The exercise is quite simple but provides A LOT of working material for inspiration. The idea is this:
Pull one random card from your Tarot deck. Then, find that same card in one or two of your other decks. Lay them out side-by-side.
With the cards side-by-side, start to compare and contrast what you see. What’s the same in all three versions? What’s different? If your cards featured people (or figures, I should say), are their expressions the same? Different? Look at each card individually… what do you think they’re feeling or thinking in each one? What about the backgrounds in the card? What's significant about them?
Once you feel like you’ve investigated and observed all you can with the cards, it’s time to brainstorm your “idea.” Re-read what you’ve written so far — does anything stand out for a story or an idea or a theme? Could you use all three in a progressive way? Do you see a character emerging in your mind?
If you’re having problems coming up with something, try approaching it from this angle — ask yourself questions about the card or ask the figure in the card questions. (See my questions below).
There’s a lot of richness you can gather just by observing the card and asking questions.
Here’s the example I put together based on these three cards.
Observations:
The woman in the first card looks like she’s hanging there on purpose… as if it’s something she does regularly. She appears lithe and limber, like contorting to the shape she’s in is effortless. Her hand is reaching toward the body of water… does she want to touch the water? Is she trying to find something there? Does she see something? Her expression almost seems serene. She isn’t worried about falling in my opinion. Heck, it doesn’t seem like she’s worried about anything in the moment.
The individual in the second card is a bit more mysterious to me. An initial glance at the expression gave me the hit of “pensive and nervous” but after staring at it for a few more minutes, I sort of see a serene expression, too. However, the chains around the arms and legs tell me that being there is probably not by choice. Who locked them up? Is the broom hovering in mid-air or is it attached to the tree in some way? The grey, ominous clouds behind the figure tell me that nothing good is happening. And what is with the key in their hands? Does it unlock the chains around their arms and legs? If so, why hasn’t it been unlocked already?
The skeleton in the third card is quite creepy. Hard to tell an expression on a skeleton’s face but given that it’s hanging behind a brick wall, I’m gonna take a wild guess that he or she was not happy to be there. I’ll suspend disbelief for a bit (because, HOW could a skeleton stay intact like that? Especially hanging upside down? Wait… don’t answer that) and ask how long have they been there? Who found them and why? What is the backstory to this gruesome discovery?
Brainstorm:
I’m most intrigued by the third card, even though I got the least amount of information from it. Maybe that’s why I’m so curious. Honestly, I really want to know how this person got there… was it because they did something terrible and this is their punishment? Was he/she a victim of a serial killer with a fetish for hanging bodies in the walls? Maybe it was a curse that this person would have to spend his/her remaining days like this? Maybe he/she isn’t dead at all… maybe the skeleton was revived when the wall was opened (I see a Mummy like situation happening here).
Interview:
Me: Are you dead or alive?
Card: Both.
Me: What do you mean both?
Card: My physical body is gone, but my spirit is trapped here.
Me: What happened?
Card: That’s a long story.
Me: I have time…
Card: Well, it all started as a game.
Me: What kind of game?
Card: The kind that stupid, impulsive teenagers play. No one was supposed to get hurt…
Me: Wait, how old are you?
Card: What year is it?
Me: 2021
Card: Well shit, it’s been almost 40 years then. Hard to tell how much time passes down here… alone… in the dark…
Me: So you’ve been dead for 40 years and no one has thought to look here? What about your friends?
Card: Turns out, they weren’t friends, I guess.
Me: Yikes.
Card: A-holes left me down here to die.
Me: Why would they do that?
Card: …
Me: It’s okay, you can tell me.
Card: I really can’t.
Me: Why?
Card: Then you’d be next…
Short story idea:
At the end of this exercise, I’ve decided that I do indeed want to find out more about this creepy skeleton who claims he died at his so-called friend’s hands because of a game. I’ve named him Fred. Fred and I have a lot more to discuss but I know that if I were to pull another card, I might just get even further into his story.