lenormand – Page 2 – Sage Sips / TaoCraft Tarot

Learn With Me: Lenormand, Two Cards

Learn tarot and intuition with moon card and fish card from the lenormand deck.

I don’t think this works quite the way the guidebook says.

I could be wrong, so let’s stick with two card readings for a while and see what turns up.

With the Lenormand deck, a “tableau” reading puts the cards on the table in a simple grid, with the “Grand Tableau” using the entire 36 card deck.

I’ve used the classic 10 card Celtic Cross layout and one of the first layouts I learned was the 9 card in Sam & Carson’s Medicine Cards. It was interesting to compare those two. Even years into reading experience 9 cards was a tipping point for me. 9 was a lot, but it was a perfectly serviceable layout with plenty of detail, but it was a heavy lift at times to work through it, even later with plenty of reading experience behind me. As soon as I would use a 10 card cross, the energy would get knotty, and contradictory and verge on nonsense. Double digits seems to be a tipping point. Rather than perpetually dancing on the edge of spilling the beans, I wrote the 5 and 7 card Modern Oracle and TaoCraft layouts that I’ve used for private readings from the beginning.

All along the time that we’ve been looking at individual Lenormand cards, the guide book has mentioned how pairings and connections with other cards could modify the individual card’s meaning. We saw energetic connections and flow in the three card reading we did last time, but it was more of a flow of meaning, like making a sentence rather than changing meanings through the series of cards.

It might be interesting to do some two card sets to see if any of those specifically meaning-modifying connections emerge.

In this case, the guide book doesn’t give a modification for either the moon card or the fish card relative to the other. I get the flow, sentence like connection again. The water connections to both cards gives the sense of intuition and flow as being the main message with the fish’s association with prosperity taking a little bit of a back seat to the mental image of actual fish swimming and in motion.

I get no sense of energy at all from the playing card insets, so will let that sit for now. Follow your own instincts if you think they are meaningful. Research the 8 of cups or King of Pentacles if either of those grab your attention.

My hunch is to keep up with the two card sets for a little while. Water, tides, depth all are associated with the images here. In RWS tarot deep water has to do with mystery, deep knowing. My hunch is that there is something here that hasn’t quite shown itself yet.

Let’s abide with it, and see what else two card sets have to say.

See you at the next sip!

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Learn With Me: Lenormand, Say It Loud – part 2

Let your love language do the talking.

Sage Sips Blog is Tarot in the time it takes to sip your coffee.

Sorry for being late getting this posted. I was a victim of my own turkey tryptophan and once I woke up from a nap, figured out what year it was and cleaned the kitchen it was getting late in the day. Instead of writing, I settled in and watched “Why Is This Happening Live” with Chris Hayes and Rachel Maddow. They are hands down one of my favorite TV duos, you can almost see the IQ points dripping off of the screen. I feel smarter just by watching those two. But you HAVE to see this special. Especially if you live in America. I don’t know if the link will work for you, I THINK you can see it on the free version of Peacock, but however you need to do it, I URGE every American of voting age to PLEASE watch this. 2024 is going to be globally, historically important – no joke, no exaggeration, no intuition, just the facts on the ground in saying that. PLEASE make time for this. Please ACT. This is for real.

Enough of the scary stuff for a Friday.

Let’s look at the Lenormand cards we drew Wednesday in part one and see for ourselves if they read any differently in concert than they do individually.

I want to say yes, but not quite in the way the guide book presents.

They do connect very strongly. My colleagues are right about the intensity and in-your-face quality Lenormand seems to be lending to the reading. The cards connect to each other very strongly, but not in a way that changes the individual card’s meaning, but in a way that strengthens the connection between the cards at a layout level. Instead of connected dots, it is a fluid, unified stream of energy and consciousness. This pathway layout flows together like a heartfelt sentence.

The fading energy card is the heart (meaning union/connection akin to the two of cups) with the jack of hearts inset (akin to a knight of cups energy). The word ESTABLISHED comes to mind. I don’t think that this card in this position means that love is leaving or diminishing. It may be solid enough that you can open your focus to other things. Your attention can embrace other things. The love doesn’t leave so much as single specific relationships take up a little less space in your total attention bandwidth. This broadening and softening of focus allows you to bring your love, compassion, and sense of connection to more people and things. EXPANSIVE also comes to mind with this card.

Hmmm…go Marie. If Marie Lenormand is regarded as one of the best “fortune tellers” it is because of the intuition she tapped into, not the cards that were named for her. Trust your own heart and noggin. I suspect that, and some cultural saavy got her to where she went.

Current energy is the Stars cards. I have no idea why this is stars, plural and the other decks have Star, singular, in the major arcana. It probably has no significance at all. In any case, the Stars is associated with divine guidance, just like the Star in RWS cards. There is also an element of wish fulfillment (cue Jiminy Cricket and “When You Wish Upon a Star” from Disney’s Pinocchio)

There is some connected-card meaning modification here. The guidebook says that when the Stars and The Heart appear together, it means that a “relationship is blessed.” In the energy I see here, however, YOU are the one doing the blessing, not some divine providence.

Finally the growing energy is the Garden card. This is associated with a place of meeting or community. The inset is stepping forward a bit. The 8 of spades is akin to the 8 of swords. If I think about the 8 of swords, its connotations of empowerment vs powerlessness and victim mindset steps forward.

In understanding the Garden card, lets look at it through the lens of its inset companion, the 8 of spades/swords.

The Pamela Smith art is my favorite representation for the eight of swords because it clearly shows some key ideas. The woman’s feet are unbound. She can’t see, hear or use her arms, but she can walk. It would require that she use care, touch and other senses to move safely, BUT she could walk forward, follow the water (intuition, emotions) at her feet through the circle of swords to safety. Often this comes gives the message of unconventional action or creative problem solving. She can use whatever is at her disposal in order to act and to escape OR she can choose to stand still and remain imprisoned. Each would require its own kind of courage and endurance.

Now, about that sentence.

Expansive love, flowing into guidance and action.

Bless your relationships (of all types)

Speak your love-language, whatever it is, and speak it loudly.

If your love language is cooking special favorite foods for loved ones, you’ve had a good couple of days. However you show affection, let it flow. In loving others we can liberate ourselves.

Thank you so much for reading!

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Learn With Me: Lenormand Tarot, introduction part 2

Learn With Me: Lenormand Tarot introduction part 2

Want to try a mini Lenormand Tarot reading for free? Leave a question on the Ask Me Anything page (or in the comments below)*

Ledoux, Jeanne Philiberte; Mlle M. A. Lenormand (1772-1843); The Bowes Museum (public domain)

Let’s meet one of the most famous card readers in history, Marie Lenormand through one of the most respected living Tarot readers, Mary K Greer.

This is only a quick thumbnail sketch about Marie Lenormand and the oracle / Tarot decks named for her. This is based on Mary Greer’s excellent article, the guidebook to the Healing Light Lenormand deck by Christopher Butler and our friend, Wikipedia. By all means, if you would like to learn more please visit and read the source material.

Last week, in part one of this introduction, we talked about being self-taught or self-initiated in Tarot. In a sense, it is unavoidable. Even if you take every class, read every book, only you can interact with Tarot. It is going to be your own unique experience and it is going to be wonderful and it is going to be just as valid as your teacher’s experience. Or mine. Or Marie Lenormand’s.

As best as I can tell from these few sources, Marie Lenormand as as self-taught as any of us. She is said to have received her first cards as a gift from “gypsies” (Butler) who taught her to read the cards. True or not, self-taught or not, Marie Lenormand seems to be a self-made person. Born in 1772 in France, orphaned at a young age and raised in a convent, Marie went on to be author, poet, and fortune teller to the stars and celebrities of the time including Robespierre and Empress Josephine.

As remarkable as Marie Lenormand was as a Tarot reader, it is even more remarkable that Lenormand Tarot we know today has little to do with her except her name.

A larger deck, “La Grand Tableau” was first published shortly after her death in 1843 and the more widely known 36 card “Petit Tableau” came significantly after that. (Wikipedia)

It seems that the Lenormand card decks were more interested in connecting with her fame as much or more than any techniques or particular cards. The Lenormand deck we’ll use in this series is the petite tableau which is based on a popular mid nineteeth century game “the game of hope” by Johann Hechtel (Butler)

While there may be little information about Marie Lenormand’s actual cards and methods, there is information about the how the cards with her name have been used over the past 150 or so years.

The entire deck is laid out in a grid….

And I stopped reading right there.

We just finished with a complex oracle.

Live is messy and complicated enough. I work best with people who want clarity and understanding. That, in my experience, is what oracles are for: clarity, comfort, creative problem solving. Oracles are for cutting through the fog, no a lot of smoke and mirrors. If there are people who can find comfort and clarity with that whole deck approach – have at it.

I’m going to approach the Lenormand deck with the same roll up your sleeves, tuck in and let’s learn this approach that we used with the 22 Oracle Dice and the 130 card plus Alleyman’s Tarot which is the same approach I used to learn Tarot in the first place 30 years ago.

It. Just. Works.

Or at least it works for me. I hope it is helpful to you, too.

Next week, we’ll start exploring one randomly drawn card at a time, connect them by pure intuition to the energy of the day, then coordinate that with the guidebook writer’s interpretation of the card. After a while, we’ll connect the cards using the Energy path and TaoCraft layouts that I wrote. Don’t worry I’m not going to hit you with the potential confusion and contradictions of large layouts. Seven cards is the largest number of cards I use in any reading ever with any deck.

Next week: Let’s do this thing – drawing a Lenormand card.

Tomorrow: weekly newsletter

Friday: revisit the growing energy card for this week, The Hierophant reversed

Thanks for reading! See you at the next sip!

Sources:

Greer, Mary K “Mlle. Lenormand, the most famous card reader of all time” copyright 2008 accessed via https://marykgreer.com/2008/02/12/madame-le-normand-the-most-famous-card-reader-of-all-time/ on September 27, 2023

Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie_Anne_Lenormand#Early_life