Lenormand is really difficult, tips?

[UrbanBramble]

I've been playing around reading Lenormand for a very long time now but not very seriously. I've started taking it more seriously lately, I've moved on to learning the GT and reading for myself and other people, saving my readings and notes, and leaving out the reading for a few days so I can kind of wander back to it and ponder.

A few things I've noticed are that when I read for myself my interpretation of the cards is almost never accurate. I know this because I know my own life and the cards don't seem to be addressing things in my life at all. When I read for other people it seems to make sense for them. When I lay out the reading and tell them what I see, they say "yeah, this is because of X" or whatever is going on in their life, and it does line up with my interpretation. While I am interpreting I am unsure of myself but it's later proven that I am correct. I've also had readings match with other Lenormand readings people have gotten from other people so that's a further testament to the accuracy of it. It's not 100% but it's better than reading for myself.

Another thing is that at a certain point in the reading I hit a "brick wall" where everything starts to look the same or I just draw a blank on a card... or I lose my place in the "sentence" and can't figure out which keyword makes the most sense in the context of the others, or I get overwhelmed by the seemingly infinite possibilities of how to interpret a string of cards. Not sure what to do in that situation except walk away and come back later, but of course I can't do that in person with a querent.

In terms of how to read I've been sort of hodgepodging my reading style together with various styles I've seen on the Forum and on online tutorials and youtube videos. Lenormand specific readings, of course. I haven't jumped in and gotten a book yet (finances). I know various teachers read various ways... maybe it's best if I find a source from just one teacher and study that? What do people think about crafting your own reading style within the Lenormand framework vs. taking on a teacher's style? I'm not talking about the difference between "winging it" and being systematic or whether to follow the Lenormand tradition, just to be clear.

I've seen a lot of threads get sidetracked into hot button issues like which reading style is best and if you can read "intuitively". Those aren't my questions (I can read other threads for that) so maybe we can limit the conversation here to problems people have had when learning, the best way to approach learning, and my specific questions? Thanks!

 

[mysticsphere]

my advice: whenever you get a chance, invest in a lenormand book. I used to rely mostly on youtube and internet blogs to learn, and, while they're helpful, i've found the most help has come from actual books. I have 3: andy boroshevengra's, rana george's, and caitlin matthews. All 3 are good, and i tend to go to each one to read different views on the same cards. You could easily just pick one and try to stick with that method; in that case, i'd suggest Caitlin Matthews book because it's the most informative and covers the most ground imo.

I have the same experience about hitting a brick wall. Rana George even says in her book that she reshuffles until she gets cards that make sense, which doesn't really appeal to me. When cards don't make sense, then it becomes like a puzzle, and i find myself learning new ways of looking at cards, which is a great learning tool. Today i learned that the fox card can mean hiding oneself, or choosing to lay low. How did i come to that? Because my reading would not have made sense any other way, and it forced me to see the card in another way, other than the traditional descriptions. That's how i'm learning atm: trying to see cards in different ways that keep to the spirit of the card's definition. I suppose that's how people develop their own reading styles. I'm not really interested in assigning lofty meanings to the cards (woman card as divine feminine, as an example), but i suppose you could do that if you wanted to.

I think you have to allow yourself some flexibility when reading lenormand, otherwise you get stuck and have no idea what the cards are talking about. When i get stuck, i use mirroring, knighting, and read the diagonals and corners of the spread to get a better idea; and i always get something to help carry the reading forward, even if i still get stuck.

My main problem with lenormand atm is still just learning all the cards properly. I don't even want to start doing grand tableau until i can master the basic double line spread and 9 card spread (my favorite spread so far) yet.

 

[Vanchica]

blocked= read less for yourself, read for others

 

[Chanah]

Just for the record, there is nothing 'untraditional' about the Fox signifying laying low or hiding. It's one of the things that foxes do, after all. Not a first meaning, the first meaning is something just plain wrong, but certainly well within traditional meanings.

Cheers.

 

[UrbanBramble]

it's nice to know I'm not the only one that gets stuck. Seems like you are advising learning from books and assigning multiple meanings to cards to allow for wiggle room.

I also use mirroring and knighting and diagonals. The problem is sometimes it's just too much information for me. It will often help with providing more info but it also leaves me scratching my head in puzzlement sometimes. I think I need to become as structured as possible about the order in which I approach the GT and be a little less structured about individual meanings of cards.

Awesome advice, thanks!

my advice: whenever you get a chance, invest in a lenormand book. I used to rely mostly on youtube and internet blogs to learn, and, while they're helpful, i've found the most help has come from actual books. I have 3: andy boroshevengra's, rana george's, and caitlin matthews. All 3 are good, and i tend to go to each one to read different views on the same cards. You could easily just pick one and try to stick with that method; in that case, i'd suggest Caitlin Matthews book because it's the most informative and covers the most ground imo.

I have the same experience about hitting a brick wall. Rana George even says in her book that she reshuffles until she gets cards that make sense, which doesn't really appeal to me. When cards don't make sense, then it becomes like a puzzle, and i find myself learning new ways of looking at cards, which is a great learning tool. Today i learned that the fox card can mean hiding oneself, or choosing to lay low. How did i come to that? Because my reading would not have made sense any other way, and it forced me to see the card in another way, other than the traditional descriptions. That's how i'm learning atm: trying to see cards in different ways that keep to the spirit of the card's definition. I suppose that's how people develop their own reading styles. I'm not really interested in assigning lofty meanings to the cards (woman card as divine feminine, as an example), but i suppose you could do that if you wanted to.

I think you have to allow yourself some flexibility when reading lenormand, otherwise you get stuck and have no idea what the cards are talking about. When i get stuck, i use mirroring, knighting, and read the diagonals and corners of the spread to get a better idea; and i always get something to help carry the reading forward, even if i still get stuck.

My main problem with lenormand atm is still just learning all the cards properly. I don't even want to start doing grand tableau until i can master the basic double line spread and 9 card spread (my favorite spread so far) yet.

 

[Sar]

I don't find Lenormand difficult, just string the cards in a sentence until it make sense.

 

[danieljuk]

I find it really accurate in my readings but it's short term, like to the point! it doesn't go deep like tarot readings in my experience so far. Like if I did 3 cards for a week reading and 3 tarot cards, the lenormand would tell me something that will happen but the tarot would go on about the themes and the long term things going on. Lenormand is to the point! That is just how I found it, great for quick direct answers which seem to come very clearly.

My tips are to have keywords for each card. Even if you look at authors and videos and other people's ideas, think of your own personal keywords for each card. Many authors have different takes on the cards, so you have to think what the symbol means to you personally. When you work out how you will use that card, stick to it! Different authors have different positive / negative slants on the cards, one author was so positive about Tree and one was really negative about Cross. Decide for yourself with your keywords.

You don't have to do really big spreads, I mostly use 3 card and 9 card spreads. Try 3 card spreads to do a weekly reading every week, it will make you look at the combos! If you can get accurate readings with the smallest combos, then move on to the much larger spreads! if you are getting blocked, go simpler! take 3 cards and think of one word for each and make a sentence! work your way up

 

[Lee]

There are a few things that I try to keep in mind for my own readings.

First (and Caitlin Matthews mentions this in her book), there are different levels of meaning for each card. Besides the general associations (Tree = health, Fox = sneaky), we can also use the symbols' literal qualities (Tree = slow-growing or branching, Fox = small furry animal). We can also use many of the cards to fulfill grammatical functions (for example, adjectives: Mountain = big, Child = small, Mice = less, Key = certainly/definitely - and, as Chanah points out, Fox = wrong).

Secondly, as Teheuti reminds us, the cards can be seen as indicating a variety of levels regarding degree of potency (Scythe = paper cut, Tree+Coffin = a cold).

Thirdly, I think it's important to find a happy medium in terms of number of keywords, i.e. not so many that a reading becomes an unwieldy process, and not so few that your vocabulary becomes too limited. A good number of keywords should allow you enough variety so that you don't get stuck. And those keywords should provide some significantly different approaches. For example, having liquidity and independence as potential Fish meanings saves you from those occasions when "money" just doesn't fit. For me, right now I'm finding that three major keywords, along with one to three ancillary keywords which might come up less often, seems to hit the sweet spot.

I agree with danieljuk that we shouldn't feel pressured to jump into the GT. Melissa a/k/a the Sassy Sybil a/k/a tarotmama does a great job in her courses of demystifying the GT and encouraging people to jump in, but I still feel that it can be overwhelming for a beginner. I don't feel like I'm ready to tackle it yet. There's plenty of reading goodness to be had in smaller spreads. I get a lot of mileage currently out of lines of five cards.

At the moment I have a bias against things like mirroring and knighting. Sometimes it seems like the point of all these techniques is to combine every single card with about a third of all the other cards in the GT. I like to keep it simpler. Of course, that's only how I feel right now - I reserve the right to change my mind!

 

[MissChiff]

Mirroring and knighting? Where the hell have I been?

 

[ana luisa]

I agree that books will give you more meat to work with. I am also cutting on expenses but Rana's and Caitlin's seem to be the popular ones and quite user friendly as well. Do remember though to work inside out and not outside in. Don't force/mold your reality to the meanings of the cards but use the meanings as a springboard to reality.