Tarot card meaning is what gives power to interpretations and predictions; each card represents something in relation to the symbol it pictures. What we often fail to understand is that the full tarot card meaning comes from the spread or the combined explanations of the cards for the question of the life issue you expect to learn more about. For instance, in the Rider Waite tarot, the tarot learner has to know the meaning for all the seventy eight cards in order to be able to read them. From the Fool to the Queen and the King, the tarot cards can be analyzed, studied and understood depending on the sensible nature of every user.

Tarot card reading has evolved over the years; for people who are no strangers to the Kabbalah or alchemy, the symbols similarity cannot pass unnoticed. Thus, all sorts of symbols have been added in time so that the present-day form of the decks is a very complex one. It is also common practice to complicate things even further by personalizing the cards and adding other subtle interpretations to the decks. Thus, many amateur philosophers have their own interpretations of the mystic representations in alchemy and the Kabbalah and they choose to add them to the cards.

The tarot card meaning greatly varies depending on the interpretation; thus, a single card receives different explanations based on the location of the card in the spread and the meaning of the other cards in its vicinity. Very often, based on the reader’s own judgment and common sense, a tarot card meaning can prove little relevance for the question under debate and thus be discarded. While in the Major Arcana, the figures have very distinct symbolism, in the Minor Arcana the emphasis is on the four alchemical elements to which the cards correspond. Thus, the swords correspond to the air, the cups to the water, the pentagrams/circles to the earth and the wands to fire.

In general lines, the tarot card meaning gives one a clue about the way he/she goes through the personal journey: is one on the right path or has one strayed away? This tarot card meaning normally results from the spreads in the Major Arcana where each card matches a certain life aspect: the fool stands for the beginning of a journey, the magician indicates the path towards wisdom, the high priestess speaks of self-balance, the empress points to pleasure, wealth and love, while the emperor is the expression of power and authority, and so on and so forth.