How to Ask a Question
The way a question is worded sets the quality of the answer. Turning a vague concern into a precise question is part of the reading itself, and it does more than prepare the ground.
How you ask shapes how the cards answer
- Open questions ("Where is this relationship heading for me?") suit tarot better than yes-or-no questions ("Will they come back?"). Tarot is good at describing situations, states of mind and the dynamics between people. It is not good at giving firm yes-or-no answers.
- Questions about things you can influence ("How should I handle this relationship?") are more likely to produce useful answers than questions entirely about other people and outside your control ("What are they really thinking?"). They also fit better with the limits of responsibility described in The Ethics of Reading.
- Once the question is set, choose a spread of a matching size: a small spread for a focused question, a larger spread for a broad one.
- However precisely a question is asked, the spread sometimes answers something else. You ask about work, for example, and draw cards that are clearly about love. This usually happens because that other matter is taking up more of the querent's mind right now than the question they actually asked. When this happens, rather than forcing every card onto the literal question, follow the direction the cards point to and check it against the situation. Recognizing "which question this reading is actually answering" takes experience, and beginners do not need to expect to see it right away. The more thoroughly the question has been thought through, and the more focused you are while shuffling and cutting, the more on-topic the cards tend to be. This is why thinking a question through before asking is part of the reading itself, beyond being preparation at the asking stage.
Turning a vague question into a precise one
The concerns querents bring are often broad, such as "Will my investments go well this year?" or "Should I do X?" Questions this wide easily get nothing more than a general "no," because if any one of the factors involved is unfavorable, the overall result is pulled down. That "no" gives the querent nothing they can act on. Breaking the big question into a few specific sub-questions (for example, splitting "Will my investments go well?" into "Will this stock go up?" and "Should I keep this property?") lets each card correspond to a clear point of judgment, and the reading holds up better inferred.
Helping a querent clarify a question usually takes two steps. First, find out what the querent really cares about: the underlying theme, as opposed to the single question they happened to bring. (On the surface they may be asking whether to go to a certain event, while what they really care about is which overall direction to take.) Then help them bring that theme back down to a few specific questions the cards can answer directly. Much of the difference between an experienced reader and a beginner lies in whether they can offer this kind of guidance. Most querents are not good at turning their situation into a clear question. This is work the reader should take on actively instead of waiting for the querent to ask clearly.
Clarifying the question takes up reading time, but for the querent it is often worth more than going straight to drawing cards. A vague question gets a vague answer that seems "right whichever way you read it" but offers no real guidance. A specific question keeps the reading focused and cuts down on over-interpretation later. For topics that call for professional judgment, such as health or legal matters, it is better to say at the clarifying stage that "specific judgments of this kind should be referred to a professional in that field" than to add it after the reading is over (see also The Ethics of Reading).