Significators | The easy way!

Published by Alison Cross on

    Welcome back, little Pages!                    
      From: Anna K Tarot

I admit, I’ve been a little unfair to you, dearest reader:  I hit you with the Golden Dawn Astrology/Court Card associations and I can see that you’re a little woozy as a result.  I honestly TRIED to make it engaging. I even drew you TREES.  I don’t even draw my SON trees.

Today I am kinder and outlining three easy ways to select an appropriate Significator.

The first is simplicity itself – simply hand over your court cards to your client and allow your client to select a card to represent himself in the reading!  It doesn’t get any easier than that, does it?

Huzzah – you don’t need to do anything tricky with decans or astrology AND it allows you to see how your client sees themselves.  Which can be enlightening.

Of course, they don’t have to explain why they chose a card, but if they are willing to share their thought processes, it will add to your store of Court Card knowledge.  I would suggest that you ask at the end of the reading, after all the work is done, so that it doesn’t look like you are fishing for information from them to enhance the reading.

The second method is equally simple:

A Page will represent someone young (probably too young to have a Tarot reading lol!)
A Knight will  represent someone younger than you (male or female)
A Queen will represent a mature Yin energy (ie could be a man)
A King will represent a mature Yang energy  (ie could be a woman)

And you chose the suit depending upon the subject matter for the reading (see below for some ideas)

The third method is to chat with your client about the issue and establish how THEY see themselves with regard to it. Listen to how they talk about the issue they want to ask you about. Do they feel hurt? Do they have a decision to make? Is it about money or work? Are people not talking? etc.

Then you flick through your lovely bundle of court cards until you find the card that best represents your sitter with relation to the question at hand.

Pages – represent beginnings of things
Knights – represent that questing spirit and dilemma
Queens – represent a mature nurturing, supportive, teaching role
Kings – represent a mature outward display of mastery

Cups – romantic or relationship – emotionalised issues
Swords – grief, poor communication – intellectualised issues
Wands – work, travel, active, intuitive – issues that involve doing something
Pentacles – wealth, health, hearth – issues about ‘being’

Just as some of the blog posts here on ‘Thrones’ have prodded you to make decisions about chosing court cards for various characters in songs etc, using this method, you will pull focus down onto one aspect of your sitter and their issue and select the court accordingly.

And don’t be shy, tell your sitter why you have chosen this card.  They may disagree, thereby helping to clarify the reading that is required.

These three methods are very flexible, allowing your sitter to be represented within the reading by a different card every time.  The methods from Wednesday’s blog post (which depend upon Astrology) will mean that the same card represents the same person every time – whether you think that’s a good thing or a bad thing is entirely up to you! πŸ™‚

Personally, I prefertoday’s methods because, while Astrology undoubtedly adds to the layers of interpretation available to you when reading, I believe that Tarot is a strong enough system to work on its own.

Which method of chosing a significator do you prefer?

This is the Page of Pentacles from the Anna K Tarot.  Click on the link, or on the image,  to visit Anna’s site and see this lovely deck!


Alison Cross

The Tarot's Court Cards are my specialist area.Β  They talk to me. Not LITERALLY though ....

8 Comments

Sharon · 25th April 2012 at 12:06 am

I tend to see the Courts as the development of experience with the energy of a suit, but then I sometimes feel I'm being unfair towards the Pages because this perspective can make them seem a little immature :/ There have been times when I felt the Page was in a much better position because they don't seem as hung up about where they're going or what they're doing as the other Courts do. As Pages represent the beginning of something… I get a feeling of liberation that doesn't come with the other cards. To me the Page is the rebel of the Courts, and I wonder if a link can be made between a Page and The Fool? The Page as trickster, jester and joker πŸ˜€ Which brings me to the fablas following quote, "Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth." J. F. Kennedy

    alisoncross · 25th April 2012 at 11:42 am

    Absolutely! The Pages are beginners and the King is outer mastery. Being immature needn't have those negative connotations that we use when we hurtle the term at our husbands. Just me then? It can represent those tentative growing stages that are the first steps on the road to that eventual outer mastery πŸ™‚

    I see how you associate the Pages with The Fool, and I love that quote!!!! I may filch it, Sharon! πŸ™‚

alisoncross · 22nd April 2012 at 3:40 pm

He's a marvellous little Page, isn't he? And thanks for your kind comments – I know that there are hundreds of Tarot blogs out there and I really appreciate the time taken to leave a comment on this one πŸ™‚

Ali x

Bonkers · 20th April 2012 at 4:36 pm

Even though I am in the anti significator boat, really like how you succintly write the ways too look at the courts here. also, such that is a great page card!

Inner Whispers · 20th April 2012 at 1:21 pm

Now these are much more my speed πŸ˜‰ However, for the most part I don't use a significator at all. Too much pantsing around with different decks, or else resticting the cards available to the reading. For the most part, using them just feels like a faff. Only time I enjoyed them was using a method called "Find the Lady" or something of the sort, which Caitlin Matthews taught at the UK Tarot Conference a couple of years back πŸ™‚

    alisoncross · 22nd April 2012 at 3:38 pm

    Thanks for the heads up about Find The Lady, I'll pursue that!

    Ali x

Identity_Concealed · 20th April 2012 at 10:20 am

Hi

Thank you so much for the post and the methods and of course drawing us the trees πŸ™‚ That is very thoughtful of you and the trees definitely caught my eyes they were so cute..

About the methods, I must confess that I cannot make myself think outside the boundaries of astrological correspondences. I will keep using the Queen or King based on that person's gender,and Sun Sign (Wands for fire signs, Cups for water signs, Swords for air signs and Pentacles/coins for Earth signs) and the same correspondences I use in Playing Cards oracles too, although they do have different meanings sometimes like Jack of Diamonds represents a man who is Libra, and Jack of Club has represented a man who is Capricorn with Venus in Sagittarius. So what I basically mean is that I cannot think of any other method for choosing significators but here you have given me something new to try. Next time when I'm reading for someone I will try one of these, specially the one you said depending on how they see themselves.

Thank you again for writing this and sharing your knowledge.

Alyna

    alisoncross · 20th April 2012 at 11:04 am

    If you have learned all the astrological associations and are happy using that method, then that's very impressive. If pressed for a significator based on someone's sign, I tend to use the one that simply allocates a Court per sign, rather than the Golden Dawn system – which I am just toooooo indolent to learn lol!

    I'd love to know how you get on with letting your sitter choose a significator, Alyna πŸ™‚

    I'll post up some examples of my own experience for people to read over the next few weeks (not next week – you can have too much of a good thing as far as significators go lol!)

    Ali x

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