Just for kicks I decided to look at the three cards that Charlotte turned over for Daniel as if it was a Three-Card Reading from a Tarot deck. This is not completely bogus, as playing cards are actually used in lieu of traditional Tarot cards sometimes to do fortune telling. The four suits of the Tarot deck's Minor Arcana are represented by the four playing card suits.
There are several differences between the playing card deck and the Tarot cards. The first difference is that the playing cards only have three "face cards" (King, Queen, Jack), while the Tarot deck has four face cards (King, Queen, Knight, Page), so instead of each suit containing 14 cards, as in the Tarot, the playing card deck has only 13 cards per suit. Another major difference is that there is no Major Arcana represented in the playing card deck. And finally, the last difference is that the playing cards have no "reversed" meaning, which the Tarot cards do - in other words, in most Tarot decks the cards may be either right-side up or upside down when layed on the table, and this difference often changes the meaning associated with the card. Other than that, one may use playing cards in a pinch if someone is just really Jonesin' for a Tarot reading and no Tarot deck is at hand.
The Three-Card Reading is a fairly common method. It's very simple: the first card represents the Past, the second card the Present, and the third card the Future. So, to do the reading, you look at the meaning of each card, and then place that meaning into the appropriate slot - so that the card that is in the "Past" position would indicate what the subject's past influences had been.
Okay, so here is the layout of Daniel's hand (I'm giving the name of the playing card, followed by the corresponding Tarot card name, and the links for each Tarot card are to an online site that provides illustrations from the commonly-used Rider-Waite Deck):
Past: Queen of Diamonds, or
Queen of Pentacles
Present: Six of Clubs, or
Six of Wands
Future: Three of Spades, or
Three of Swords
Here are the definitions of these three cards given as if they were Tarot cards (taken from the online
Tarotpedia site's definitions):
Queen of Pentacles: This card has two possible interpretations. Any time a face card shows up in a Tarot reading, it may indicate that it could either be an actual real live person who is close to the subject of the reading, or it could also represent some ideas or influences at play. Or it could be a combination of both. In this case, the Queen of Pentacles would represent a mature woman who is very "earthy", and who probably has a dark complexion or dark hair. If this card represented some influences, they would be:
* Nurturing, generous, resourcefulness
* Devotion to family and community
* Fertility, abundance and prosperity
* Sensuality
Six of Wands: This card represents the following influences:
* Victory, triumph through hard won battles, over stiff competition.
* Receiving praise, acclaim, and laurels for your victory.
* A warning in this card is that with such acclaim can easily come pride. Beware of that becoming prideful.
* Charisma
Three of Swords: This card represents the following influences:
* Cutting to the heart of a matter
* Betrayal in a relationship
* Heartbreak or sorrow. Also, the need to understand your sorrow.
* Severing emotional ties -- hence, a separation or divorce
* Loneliness
* An avoidance or deadening of our emotions or feelings. For example, being a workaholic or tending to over-intellectualize our experiences are a couple of ways to avoid feeling or experiencing our emotions. Thus, beware allowing our intellect to kill our emotions.
So, to do the reading, this would indicate that in Daniel's past there were influences at play that involved either a very earth mother type person, or that he was surrounded by a very warm, nurturing, supportive environment.
In Daniel's present he is undergoing a very difficult test, but he is doing okay at the present. There seems to be some warning, though, of being overly confident from success so far...
Daniel's future does not look too happy. The Three of Swords is a pretty complicated card, having several main influences, including over-intellectualising, distancing oneself from one's emotional or love life through overwork or running away. It also represents loneliness, heartbreak, emotional loss, lack of nurture. In other words, the Future for Daniel represents the complete 180 degree opposite of his Past!
Now, what was interesting to me in that scene was that Daniel got the third (Future) card wrong. Instead of him remembering it to be the Three of Spades, he thought it was the Ten of Cups. So, let's look at the Ten of Cups:
Ten of Hearts, or
Ten of Cups
Influences:
* Abundant blessings and emotional well-being or fulfillment
* Joy and serenity of being at one with the people in your life
* A happy, stable relationship or home life
* The attainment of purity and happiness through the integration of your emotional experiences
* The Ten of Cups may signify a happy family.
* The Ten of Cups is a "Stage Card" which may imply an illusion of happiness in a relationship or it may indicate the ideal of a happy marriage or family. It also can say that joy comes from how we view our life, not from what happens to us.
So what this would mean (from my interpretation of it) is that Daniel
WANTS his future to be a culmination of happiness, a successful marriage, a nurturing family life, etc. He wants the same thing that he has had in his Past.
BUT...
Instead, what it looks like he's going to be getting is heartache, betrayal, loneliness and sorrow.
So, thoughts, suggestions, comments?
