Hopefully if you are already familiar with the basics, meditation is already bringing calm and inner peace into your life.

Taking it a step further can help you discover new insights about yourself, inner direction and inner needs.

Meditating on a tarot card can help you find all of these things and more besides. You have the opportunity to find insight and inspiration on the meaning of the card, guidance on how it can help you and why it appeared in your spread, and if you choose a specific card, you may be able to embrace its qualities into your life.

You can meditate on any card and if you choose to select a random card from the deck, it may be a good idea to choose some of the lighter cards to begin with, learning lessons from the tarot should be an enlightening and empowering experience and if you have not done this before, choosing a card like the nine or ten of swords or The Devil or Tower, might be too intense.

To engage the card and understand its message to you, or embrace its meaning try the following meditation:

Once you have chosen your card find the best place to meditate, and set the card in front of you so you can easily gaze upon it.

Close your eyes and take yourself into a breathing meditation in the way you usually use.

Allow thoughts to leave your mind and relax the body.

Open your eyes and focus on the card.

Look at every detail on the card, even the smallest thing, take in the colours, the place, the people, who is the central character? What draws your eyes?

Now close your eyes again.

Think about a path ahead of you and follow the path until you come to a door.

Go through the door.

You are in the card, look around you and see all the detail you saw in the card.

Find the central character, ask them what their message is for you.

Engage them in conversation and talk about the message, talk about the surroundings, ask questions.

Enjoy being in the card, pick things up, touch things, if there is water – paddle your feet!

When you feel ready, bring yourself to the present.

Open your eyes and take a drink to ground yourself.

Write down any messages in your journal if you have one.

Another reason to meditate on the tarot would be as part of familiarising yourself with the cards and their meanings in order to enable more insightful readings.

Try the following meditation to help understand the cards better.

Choose your card and find a comfortable place to meditate, and set the card in front of you so you can easily gaze upon it.

Close your eyes and take yourself into a breathing meditation in the way you usually use.

Allow thoughts to leave your mind and relax the body.

Open your eyes and focus on the card.

What words spring to mind when you look at the card? How do you feel? How would you feel if you were the central character?

Take yourself down that path again, with the door at the end and enter through the door.

This time the environment is the same but the central character is missing.

Assume the place of the central character and engage in the environment, talk to any other characters in the card – how does that feel? What are you talking about?

Take time to understand how the character feels and see if you can relate to that.

Keep exploring until you feel ready to stop.

When you feel ready, bring yourself to the present.

Open your eyes and take a drink to ground yourself.

Write down any meanings that came to you in your journal if you have one.