Beginners Guide to Card Reading | Oracle VS Tarot, Tips, My favourite decks.

If you had asked me six months ago, a year ago, if I'd be filming this video, I would have said you were crazy. But here we are. Hello guys, welcome back to my channel. If you are new here, my name is Amara and I am a yoga teacher currently based in Dubai. And since moving here, my eyes have just been opened up to the world of holistic healing and energy healing. And that is kind of the reason I'm coming to you today with this beginner's guide to oracle and tarot cards. I'm really excited to film this video. If you had asked me six months ago, a year ago, if I'd be filming this video, I would have said you were crazy. But here we are embracing where life takes us. But yes, if you don't already follow me on Instagram, go and check me out there. I'm Amara Thompson. But without further ado, we will get straight into this video. Also feel free to grab yourself a cup of tea. Yeah, maybe some biscuits and we will get into this. So chances are, if you are here, it means you're probably a little bit interested in maybe what oracle cards or tarot cards are, and you're maybe interested in learning how to maybe use them and add them to your mindfulness or spiritual rituals or routines. Or maybe you really want to learn how to read tarot. As I come into this, I always come towards card readings from a space of, first of all, they're not religious. They're not anything like that. They are a way of connecting to whatever that higher power you believe in is. So whether it's God, whether it's your highest self, whether it's the universe, no matter what that is that you feel is guiding you if you're on your way through your life, this is what the cards will help you connect to. I also approach oracle cards and tarot cards with a very therapeutic approach. The change that they can make, especially for others, but also for ourselves when we look at these cards and they bring guidance or reassurance or confirmation that we're doing the right thing, that can give people so much more confidence. It can help people find so much more self love. And it's just a really, really beautiful way to connect not only to yourself, but also to maybe guidance that you're looking for. So yes, just wanted a quick disclaimer there that this isn't anything too woo-woo. It is pretty woo-woo, let's be real. I think I always say I'm not that woo-woo and here we are. But yeah, just so you know my general approach to these things. So I think that to get started, the first place to start is what is the difference between oracle and tarot cards? I think that's a really, really good question. And it's a really good place to get started. Cause when you're first looking into cards, you're not really sure what to go for. So tarot cards are a set of cards and these cards are exactly the same in every single deck. So a tarot card will have exactly the same cards. It will have the suits of cups, wands, pentacles and swords. It'll have those four suits plus the major arcana. And those cards will always be the same, but you can buy different cards that have been designed by different designers. So they might have different artwork, but the cards are exactly the same. Sometimes designers will put in one or two extra cards, but all tarot cards are going to have the same amount of cards and the same names of the cards and everything like that. Now, oracle cards, there are no rhyme or reason to them. So an oracle cards are when whoever the artist or the designer was had their guidance, give them messages to create a deck of cards. There is no set number that they have to be and the artwork is completely their own and the messages are completely your own. So oracle cards are very freestyle. They're very easy to read. Meanwhile, tarot is a little bit more of a skill and it takes a little bit more studying to help you read them. So yes, that was the first question done. So if you are a little bit like me and you come from a yoga practice, how you can then incorporate these cards into your practice is it can be really beautiful at the end of a meditation to maybe pull a card. It's honestly so, so easy to incorporate it. And that's where I started. I just started with, at the end of my yoga practice, after Shavasana, I would pull out an oracle deck, so not a tarot deck, and I would just pull a card and see what it said. And that really helped me. I loved that. And the deck that I would probably recommend the most for if you are starting maybe your card reading journey or whatever it is, if you just wanna connect or you just want something fun to prompt your journaling, because this can be a really beautiful way to prompt journaling as well, would be, I've literally got all of my decks here to show you guys at some point, but it would be this deck. Now, if you are anything like me and you like pretty colors and pinks, anyone who follows me on Instagram will know this, this deck is stunning. This is the Work Your Light deck by Rebecca Campbell. And I think the artwork is by Danielle Noel. Stunning, honestly beautiful. The cards in this deck just are everything. And I trust this deck so much. I feel like I connected with it really, really instantly. And I just, I still use it every single day. It's so beautiful. However, because I think I'm so connected to this deck, I find it very difficult to do readings for other people from this deck. Sorry. I find it quite difficult to do readings for other people from this deck, because it reads for me so well. It's weird, I know. So let me just show you maybe some of the cards in this deck. So yeah, that's a really beautiful one. The artwork is literally just like stunning. That one's stunning as well. I've put that one quite a lot. Really, really beautiful. I wonder if I can find my favorite card in here. Oh, there it is. Literally this card, I connect this card on a soul level. I just love it. So yes, if you are going to maybe get your first Oracle deck, it's really, really important that when you first get your deck, you cleanse it. So with Sage, maybe you pop a crystal on top, just allowing it to have the right energy, because energy is science. Like everything carries an energy. So when you are getting something new, whether it be a crystal, an Oracle deck, maybe even a yoga mat, you want to cleanse the energy and make sure that it's all in the right space. So that's the first thing to do when you get your deck. Then I would really recommend before pulling a card, make sure that you center. So this is why after Shavasana, it's a really lovely time. You need to be in a slightly more peaceful state. Monkey brain needs to go off so that you can really, really connect. And definitely always go with a question. So I tend to shuffle, spread the cards out, and I might go with a question of what am I being called to pay attention to today? Or what do my guides want me to know? Or what messages do I need to hear? But maybe you have a more clear question of what should I do in this situation? And you can also go to your deck with that. So yes, make sure you cleanse your deck. Always ask a question. And after you use your deck as well, it can be really nice to just pop a stick of selenite on top. It just makes sure that the energy is all clear. If you're familiar with crystals, selenite is a very cleansing crystal, which is really, really nice. So I definitely recommend that. If you ever have more questions about these things, please send me a message. I'm aware that I am now very into this sphere of crystal healing and tarot and energy healing, and I just literally live for it. So if anything I say sounds like crazy too much, just get in touch and let me know. There are also lots of different oracle decks that you can get. So maybe if that one doesn't resonate with you, there are so many. As a yoga teacher, I actually really like to encourage using decks within my yoga class. So at the end of the yoga class, I will spread a deck out and I will say, if anyone feels called to come and pull a card, feel free. And I just love being able to share something because I do that every time I practice, I pull a card. I love being able to share that with my students as well and really open them up to the world of yoga is more than just asana. It is a mindfulness practice. It is a spiritual practice and how can you embellish it and enhance it? So the deck that I love to use for this, and honestly, this deck is just, it's amazing for this, is the Yogic Path Deck by Sahara Rose. And this is amazing because it has yoga philosophy on it. So it's so beautiful as a yoga teacher to bring to my students. And not only are they pulling a card, but they're also learning a little bit more about yoga philosophy, which I live for. Oh my gosh, I'm dropping things everywhere. Let me just show you some of the cards in this deck. So this is a very different feel from the deck before, but it's still equally as beautiful. So you may resonate with some of these cards a little bit more. So that's Tantra, really beautiful. And it's got all of your yamas and niyamas on it, which I just love. There you go, niyamas there. Honestly, I love this deck for that exact reason. And to be honest, I mostly use this deck for classes. I don't tend to use it too much for my own readings for no reason other than it's usually in my teaching bag, but I would use it for my own readings as well. If I use it for others, I'm happy to use it for myself. If you are reading for others, whether it be tarot or oracles, it's really, really important that you cleanse the deck because people's hands get on it and they can transfer energy into it. And then you might find that if your readings are feeling a little bit weird and a little bit off, it's just because the deck needs to be cleansed of someone else's energy and it's really confused. I'm aware that if you are so new to this world, I might sound nuts talking about the deck needing to be cleansed of other people's energy, but trust me, it's a thing. If you wanna talk more about energy and why it's just 100% a thing, I'm always keen to talk about that in my DMs as well. But yes, to be honest, I think that's everything you need to know about oracle. They're so easy. With oracle, they always often come with messages on the card. So it's like a little, let me show you. So with an oracle deck, it will always come with a guidebook. So this guidebook will have all of the meanings to the cards in them. And then when you pull the card as well. So this one, when you pull it, you can see it has the name, which is pillar of light. And then it's also got a little description as well as a prompt. With tarot, you wouldn't have that, but that's why oracle is so user-friendly. And then you would go in and just check the meaning in the guidebook for some more clarity. So if you are new to this world of cards and using them to connect to your higher self, I 100% recommend getting your hands on an oracle deck. They are a really, really beautiful way to start. You don't need to know anything about it. And you can literally just pull a card at the end of your yoga practice and use it as a journal prompt. So yes. Okay, moving on to the world of tarot. I'm really trying to make sure this video isn't too long, but there is so much talk about tarot. So tarot is a lot more of a skill. I personally went and learned from a really experienced tarot lady on how to read tarot, and she was amazing. And she was the one who actually taught me the really therapeutic approach to tarot. So I personally do not believe in using tarot to predict the future, because the future changes the minute you walk out the room. So you could predict your future right now, but it would be different depending on what you do. Saying that, I do think that it can maybe mark milestones that are coming up in your life, but I don't think you can predict the future with tarot. So if someone were to come in to me and say, can you read the cards for when I'm gonna fall in love with the man of my dreams? I'd be like, I'd rather not, because I personally, I don't really believe in it. Like, I do believe that it could give you a date, but there are so many reasons why that date may not that come to fruition, because you are a human with free will. Right, so my approach to tarot is more so giving people the guidance in that very moment that they need to maybe make a difficult decision, or maybe keep going when they've had a hard week. And I'm all about how yoga can heal people and how yoga can bring you so much more peace. And I feel that tarot is a really, really beautiful way to do that as well. So yeah, there's nothing really scary about tarot. I know before I learned how to read it, I was very like, oh my goodness, tarot's a bit weird, tarot's a bit scary, it's a bit witchy, but it's really not. It's a really lovely, lovely, lovely, lovely, lovely, lovely therapeutic modality that you can bring to people if that's your thing, or maybe you just bring it to yourself. So tarot, as I said, you can have, the original deck is this one. Gosh, I'm having to move them around so much. The original tarot deck is this one, and it's the Rider Waite original tarot deck. Now this tarot deck is obviously very old. It's the original one, and it's been remade throughout the years in the same style. If you are starting to learn to read tarot, I cannot recommend enough that you start with an original Rider Waite tarot. They're not pretty. If you're like me, they're not pretty. They don't resonate with me at all, but I still go back to them because they're sort of what I learned on, and every other deck, tarot deck that I use, I will cross-reference to my Rider Waite tarot, so I'll remember what that card looked like in the Rider Waite tarot and use that to help my reading. So I can't recommend enough that you start with one of these. Once you're comfortable reading the Rider Waite tarot, that's when you can sort of get into the world of prettier tarot decks, which is so my thing because those colors, they don't vibe for me. I need pink and I need pretty. So this is my current tarot collection. I do have two more in the mail, but they're taking quite literally years to get here. It's a drama. I'm really not very patient about all of this, but yes. Tarot does come with a guidebook, but obviously, if you were reading these tarots for other people, you wouldn't really wanna be looking in the guidebook, especially if you were charging someone for a reading, which, if you're doing it for fun, it's a bit different, but yes, a part of tarot is being able to interpret the meaning yourself, and I also think if you're constantly going to the guidebook, you might miss some meanings that were meant to come to you for that card as well. So for example, let's start with this one. This is a fairly new deck to me, and I love it. It's the Gentle Heart Tarot by Vanessa Smyner. I mean, if you're into cards at all on YouTube, she's like the tarot queen, so go and check her out if you want, she does tarot readings over YouTube, which is very cute, but yes, this deck is very beautiful. I love it, it's very pretty, all pink and just stunning. But yes, all of these cards, although they might be slightly different, so I think in this one, instead of swords, you have diamonds, but it's still the same card. So you have a major arcana, then you have the minor arcanas, which are the swords, wands, pentacles, and cups. So what I will do is I'll give you a super-duper brief rundown of things, tips that I have to help you read tarot. I may do a more in-depth video on this if you're interested, so just comment below if that's something that you'd want. But my biggest tips for reading tarot would be, first of all, learn your elements. So you've got fire, water, air, and earth. It's really important you know the qualities of these elements, like really, really, really important. Obviously, they relate to the zodiac signs, but they also just give you a really good feel of what these cards are about. Once you know those elements, those elements relate to the four suits of the minor arcana. So earth element is pentacles, so it's all about finance, stability, foundations, the root chakra, things like that. The water element is the cups, so emotions, creativity, intuition, all of those things. The air element is swords, so all about communication, all about maybe technical, maybe about work, things like that, very communicative, very, yeah, intelligent, and things like that. And then the wands is related to the fire element, so this is all about passion, this is all about fiery energy, this is all about what excites you, what lights you up, and things like that. So those are really, really important to know, because then when you see a minor arcana card, you will know what they mean. In terms of the major arcana, you just have to learn the meanings of those. There are loads of resources on the internet to help you, and I can do a more in-depth video if that is useful. Also, it's really, really helpful when looking at the minor arcanas to look at the numbers and learn the meanings of each number, so there's a little bit of numerology in this. Okay, for the sake of this video not being way, way, way too long, I have not gone over the meaning of each of the numbers, but if you are interested in learning more about the numerology of each of the cards, there are loads of resources online, and I can, of course, make a more in-depth tarot video, so if you're interested, comment below, but otherwise, let's continue. Yes, so my biggest tips for tarot would be to learn your elements and how they relate to the cards, and also learn the meanings of each of the numbers of the cards in the minor arcana suits. I have so many more tips for tarot, but if you're interested, just let me know, and I can make a whole video about tips about tarot. I'd love to do that, but I think overall, my biggest tips for if you are a beginner or if you want to really up-level your card reading or the guidance that you're getting from your cards is first of all, make sure you've got a deck that you really, really connect with, so for me, I really connect with the Work Your Light deck because it's beautiful and I love the colours, but if I was using a deck I didn't really connect with, I would find it a lot more tricky, so make sure you have a deck that you really, really connect with. You really feel like your soul is calling you towards that deck because that's the deck you're meant to have. My second thing would be to make sure you are always cleansing your deck. If you're just using it for yourself, you can cleanse it sort of every lunar cycle or every week or every month, whatever. You usually know, you get a good feeling when you need to. Ways of cleansing it are maybe using sage or palo santo or even just placing a bit of selenite on top or any form of crystal on top to help cleanse the energy throughout the deck. What were my other tips, let me just check. Oh, always ask your deck a question, so make sure that you're not just, I don't know, pulling a card and then being like, oh, what does this mean? Because it makes it a lot harder for any guidance from whatever you believe in, any guidance that's coming down, it's trying to give you a message, but it wants to communicate with you, so if you ask it a question, it can give you an answer, but if you don't ask a question, what's coming through is them literally just trying to guide you, and you're gonna be like, oh, what does that mean? But when it's in relation to a question, you may find so much more clarity on what it means. And lastly, it would be to make sure that you always connect deeply, have a bit of a mindful moment before you pull a card. Don't just wipe the cards out and pull one. You really need to connect and allow your intuition to guide you towards that card. If you are shuffling and a card falls out, that is your card, so make sure you read that card because that's the universe literally throwing a card at you. And if you sort of close your eyes, connect in, you're saying to yourself, what messages do I need to see today? The minute you open your eyes, the card that you see immediately before you're even really thinking, that is your card, so don't have a think, sort of go through, pull the first card you see because that's the card you're meant to have. We so often have our intuition there and then our mind takes over. Allow yourself to be intuitively guided towards these cards. And the biggest tip I have and I want to show you is when you pull a card, before you read the guidebook, and this is what I say when I do my moon circles, this is what I encourage the women to also do before they read the guidebook, is to just look at the card and see the pictures. So what is the picture telling you? How is it making you feel? So in this, there are pyramids in the background, she's in black and white, but the water is bright blue. Just looking at the messages through that card, there's a stormy sea, what does that mean? Why is she in hiding? And things like that, it's really exploring it and you will find that the meanings might be hidden in the pictures in the card before you even read the guidebook. The pictures are there for a reason, it's why it's so important that you connect with them, but really, really analyze the card and then read the meaning because that will help you so, so much. So yes, I think that is all my beginner tips for doing your own card readings or starting to add card readings to your mindfulness practices. As I said, if you are interested in learning more about tarot, please let me know and I can create a video all about that. If you are interested in anything else and wanna request a video, I would love it, just let me know, but I hope you have a lovely, lovely rest of your day. If you wanna catch up with me elsewhere, my name on Instagram is Amara Thompson and I am a yoga teacher and I have a online membership called the Move With The Moo membership where we flow and have yoga classes that are aligned with the lunar cycles. So if that sounds like your cup of tea, it will be linked below. I would absolutely love to have you and yes, I will see you in my next video. Bye guys.