Learn Tarot: A 6-Week Study Plan for Beginners

You can learn tarot in six weeks by studying a small group of cards each week, pulling one card a day, and writing down what you notice. A good tarot course gives that plan structure and feedback, but the daily habit is what makes the 78 cards feel familiar rather than overwhelming.

I have watched many complete beginners start tarot, and the pattern is always the same. People who try to memorise every meaning in a weekend give up. People who follow a steady, modest plan are reading comfortably for themselves within a couple of months. This is the plan I would hand you if you sat across the table from me.

Before You Start: What You Need

You need very little, and none of it has to be expensive.

• One deck. Choose a deck with fully illustrated cards, where every card shows a scene and not only a number of cups or swords. The Rider-Waite-Smith tradition is the one most books and classes refer to, so it is the easiest to study from.
• One notebook. Paper works better than a phone here. Writing by hand slows you down enough to actually look at the card.
• Fifteen to twenty minutes a day. Short and daily beats long and occasional. Pick a time you can keep, such as with your morning tea or before bed.

One more thing to settle before week one: tarot is a tradition of symbols and storytelling. I teach it as a tool for reflection and for asking better questions, not as a way of stating what will certainly happen. Holding it that way makes you a calmer and more honest reader.

Week 1: Meet the Deck and the Major Arcana, Part One

Spend the first two days simply handling the cards. Shuffle them, lay all 78 out on the floor, and sort them into the two big families: the 22 Major Arcana and the 56 Minor Arcana. Notice which pictures you like, which you avoid, and which confuse you. Write those first reactions down, because they are useful later.

For the remaining days, study the Major Arcana from The Fool to The Chariot, cards 0 to 7. For each card:

1. Look at the picture for a full minute before reading anything.
2. Write three things you see and one feeling the scene gives you.
3. Only then read the traditional meaning in your guidebook and add two or three keywords.

This order matters. Your own observation comes first, the book second.

Week 2: The Major Arcana, Part Two

Continue with Strength through The World, cards 8 to 21. That is fourteen cards in seven days, so take two a day, using the same look, write, read method.

At the end of the week, lay all 22 Major cards in a row and tell the story aloud as one journey, from the open beginning of The Fool to the completion of The World. It will feel awkward the first time. Do it anyway. Speaking the sequence as a story is the fastest way I know to fix the cards in memory, because you are remembering a plot, not a list.

Begin your daily one-card pull this week too. Each morning ask a simple question such as "What should I pay attention to today?", draw one card, and write one sentence. In the evening, add one line about how the day actually went.

Week 3: The Four Suits and the Numbers

The Minor Arcana looks like a mountain of 56 cards, but it is really a grid. Learn the two sides of the grid and you can work out most cards without memorising them.

The suits are traditionally linked to four areas of life:

• Cups for feelings and relationships
• Pentacles for work, home and practical matters
• Swords for thoughts, words and decisions
• Wands for drive, creativity and action

The numbers follow a simple arc: Aces are beginnings, twos are choices and partnerships, threes are growth, and so on up to tens, which are endings and fullness.

This week, study the Aces to fives of all four suits. Lay the four Aces side by side, then the four twos, and compare. Ask yourself what a "beginning" looks like in feelings compared with a beginning in work. You are learning to combine suit and number, which is a skill and not a memory test.

Week 4: Sixes to Tens, and Your First Three-Card Spread

Finish the numbered cards using the same side-by-side comparison. By now your notebook will have a page or half a page for most of the deck.

Midweek, add a three-card spread to your practice, two or three times a week alongside the daily card. Keep the positions plain:

1. The situation as it stands
2. What I am not seeing
3. A helpful next step

The real lesson of a spread is that cards talk to each other. Do not read three separate meanings. Look for what repeats, such as two cards from the same suit, figures facing toward or away from one another, or a mood that shifts from left to right. Write the reading as one short paragraph, as if you were telling a friend.

Week 5: The Court Cards

Pages, Knights, Queens and Kings are where most beginners get stuck, so they deserve a full week of their own. I find it easiest to think of them as sixteen characters, each with a manner of behaving:

• Pages are learners and messengers, curious and new to the subject.
• Knights are in motion, each in the style of their suit.
• Queens hold the quality of the suit inwardly and with maturity.
• Kings express it outwardly, through responsibility and direction.

For each court card, write the name of someone you know, or a character from a film or book, who behaves that way. In a reading a court card may point to a person, or to an attitude you are being invited to try on. Practise asking, "Is this someone in the situation, or a way of acting?"

Week 6: Putting It Together and Reading for Someone Else

The last week is all practice. No new cards.

• Do one three-card reading for yourself every day and write it up in full sentences.
• Read once or twice for a willing friend or family member. Ask them to choose a question about a decision or a situation, not a yes or no.
• Look back through your daily card notes from the past five weeks. See which cards came up often and how your one-line readings have changed.

Reading for another person teaches you things that solo study cannot: how to phrase a question, how to describe a difficult card kindly, and how to say "I am not sure what this one means here" without losing your footing. Good practice also means being clear about limits. Tarot is for reflection, and it is not a substitute for professional advice on legal, financial or health matters.

Self-Study or a Tarot Course: Which Suits You?

This plan works well on your own if you are disciplined and happy learning from books. There are a few points where a teacher makes a real difference:

• Feedback. Alone, you cannot easily tell whether you are reading the cards or reading your own hopes into them.
• Card combinations. Watching an experienced reader link three or five cards teaches more than any keyword list.
• Ethics and boundaries. How to handle sensitive questions and where to say no are best learned through discussion.
• Company. Practising with fellow students gives you readings to do and people to compare notes with.

Many of my students begin with a few weeks of self-study exactly like this, then join a class once they know they enjoy it. Others prefer guidance from day one. Neither route is better. It depends on how you learn.

If you would like to follow this kind of plan with a teacher and a group beside you, have a look at the tarot and other courses on my learning site. The course pages give the current format and details, and you can choose the starting point that matches where you are today.