Many people are introduced to tarot as if it’s a kind of spiritual vending machine:

You shuffle the deck.
You put your question in.
You draw the cards.
You extract an answer.

And when that answer feels unclear, contradictory or vague, the conclusion is almost always the same: “I’m doing something wrong.”

This assumption is so common that it often goes unquestioned. The fault must be with me, the reader. With my intuition. With my lack of skill, focus or spiritual sensitivity.

But tarot isn’t, and was never supposed to be, a machine you operate, it’s meant to be a relationship.

And like any meaningful relationship, closeness doesn’t come from efficiency. It doesn’t come from memorising meanings, following the right steps in the right order, or even putting a coin in the right slot. It comes from attention, curiosity and time spent patiently listening and understanding — especially when what’s being communicated isn’t immediately obvious.

Tarot responds to how you approach it. When you approach the cards as a tool, the questions you ask tend to be blunt and transactional:

“What does this mean?”

“Should I do this?”

“What will happen?”

“Yes or no?”

These are understandable questions; especially when you’re searching for reassurance, certainty or direction. But when tarot is placed in that role and simply expected to perform, pressure enters the picture almost immediately.

And pressure doesn’t work when you’re navigating those bigger questions that can be summed up as, “Who am I?” and “Why am I here?”

But when you approach tarot as a relationship — a conversation between you and the cards — the questions have a chance to soften and deepen:

“What is this showing me about who I am?”

“What pattern is being mirrored back to me?”

“What is trying to come into my awareness?”

These questions don’t demand instant answers. They invite deeper reflection.

This is where tarot becomes genuinely supportive for self-growth and purpose. Not because it tells you who to be, but because it reflects who you’re becoming — often before you consciously know it yourself.

A relationship with tarot unfolds slowly. It’s built through repeated encounters with the same images at different moments in your life. Through noticing how a card that once felt opaque now speaks to you. Through discovering that your responses to the cards change as you change.

This is also why rushing to interpretation can sometimes dull the experience.

Take a moment to let the images speak to you before rushing to interpret them — before applying a meaning, just let the image have its say. Before you have the explanation, you’ll often find you have an internal, unspoken response.

Your unconscious mind understands symbolism long before your logical mind steps in to interpret it. Your body, your imagination and memory all respond instantly — often very subtly — to the imagery and symbolism on the card.

When you give yourself permission to pause and notice what’s happening internally before analysing, something shifts. Tarot stops being something you do and becomes something you listen to.

Trust begins to replace pressure. And trust, like understanding, is built through connection — not performance.

If you want to explore this shift more consciously, try journaling with these prompts:

“When I sit with my tarot deck, I tend to treat it like…” Finish the sentence, without editing, as many times as you want.

Then continue with:

“If I listened to the cards with curiosity, I’d start to notice…”

There are no correct or incorrect answer here. Only information.

For many spiritual explorers, tarot isn’t really about prediction at all, it’s about orientation and navigation. About finding a way to stay in conversation with the deeper part of yourself while moving through uncertainty, change and who it is that you’re becoming.

Tarot doesn’t hand down answers from out of the blue; it reflects what’s already there within you — within your own deeper wisdom. And perhaps the most important question isn’t whether tarot is delivering easy, clear answers — but whether you’re creating a supportive relationship with it that leads to deeper understanding.