A lot of my readers still say the hardest thing for them in Lenormand readings is knowing how exactly to interpret the card meanings in their particular readings.
Just to illustrate this, and with no initial clues at all, I’ll give you some cards I’ve pulled for a brand new reading. Just take a look and see what you can work out so far.
How To Decide Which Meaning(s) to Use: Step-by Step
First off, in this post, I’m assuming you’ve already got yourself familiar with the cards’ most basic, underlying meanings. If you haven’t, as well as all the listed Lenormand Card meanings, you might want to check out How Do I Know Which Lenormand Meaning is Right and 6 Tips For Getting Confident About Card Meanings. Without a good understanding of the underlying meaning of all the cards, and building your confidence in that, you will always find being certain about the meanings more difficult.
Underlying Meanings
For the record, the most basic underlying meanings of the cards in this particular 9-Card reading are as follows:
Block—Status—Journey
Lovely—Love—Burden
Confusion—New Start—Hopes
If I were to read the cards as is, completely blind, with no other knowledge, I would broadly say:
- These cards are to do with a love, passion or a romance situation. They show a blossoming status; a lovely new beginning but with burden or responsibility attached to do with that status or officialdom in some way (Tower-Bouquet-Storks-Cross around a Heart card.)
- It’s about a situation where the status of a journey or progress of some kind has been blocked or prevented (Mountain-Tower-Ship)
- The key ‘answer’ to my reading is that the pleasures & good things about this love or passion come weighted with a burden or troubles of some kind (Bouquet-Heart-Cross)
- Some additional information about this situation is that it seems to involve going into a brand new but unclear situation with high hopes & perhaps big ambitions (Clouds-Storks-Stars).
- The past involves a pleasant delay or block of some kind, followed by an uncertain or unclear (perhaps blind or vague?) loveliness – a dreamlike state, perhaps? (Mountain-Bouquet-Clouds).
- Now there is a brand new love, passion or romance that has an element of status or ‘officialdom’ about it. A power couple perhaps? (Tower-Heart-Storks)
- Ahead is a journey of some kind that is carrying the weight of big hopes, dreams and ambitions (Ship-Cross-Stars)
- Going from past to future, we see that there’s a blockage of some sort to do with the hopes for this love (Mountain-Heart-Stars) and that the progress is unclear (Clouds-Heart-Ship).
So this already gives us quite a bit of information just from the most basic of the card meanings. Now what?
In some circumstances, a general prediction, for instance, we might decide this is actually enough information for our purposes. All the basic meanings are there, we happen to have a centre card that seems to already be giving us a big clue, and we already see a “story” forming.
On the other hand, we may decide that we want to hone this reading even further and make it more exact.
Bear in mind, a good and confident Lenormand interpretation is always a blend of a number of factors. The more familiar and at ease with that blend you are, the easier you will find it, and the more natural, ‘flowing’ and obvious your interpretations will seem to you.
5 Questions To Decide Which Lenormand Meaning To Use
Now we’ve got our basic meanings, we’re going to go a little further and try to make our reading even more precise. Here are the main questions we need to ask ourselves.
1. What Is The Exact Context and Situation?
First off (and yes, I know I keep banging on about this) the context of the situation will colour the cards’ meanings. The meanings if you are talking about a career situation will be quite different from those of a domestic crisis; a world news context is not going to give the same meanings as a romance or a day-to-day domestic or family situation.
Here is the context and situation for the above reading. Obviously, in this case, the clue was in the centre card, and I did use it as a key card, although do bear in mind, this will not always be the case.
- A good male friend is on an extended round the world trip with his brand new girlfriend, but they are partway through the trip and have been having problems and arguments.
The context in this case is therefore Love, in particular, “my friend’s romance on a trip.”
What impact does this context & situation have on the Meanings in this reading?
First, it adds a little nuance to those basic meanings
Romantic block or obstacle —Status, poss relationship status—Journey
Loveliness/Pleasure—Love & Romance—Burdens & Responsibilities
Lack of Clarity/Blindness—New Start—Hopes & Dreams
Click HERE to see what additional details this might add to the reading.
2. What Is The Exact Question That You Asked The Cards?
The focus in your reading can be honed even further by the question that you asked. For example, “What actions should my friend take?” would involve slightly different meanings to “What are the main events that will happen on this trip?”
For more information on asking good questions, take a look at the How To Ask Lenormand Questions To Get The Best Results post.
In this case, I simply asked the cards to give me more details about my friend’s romance. So the interpretations I already have are fine; there’s no more info I can get based on this question.
3. What Do You Already Know About The Situation at Hand?
Now, this is where your relationship and knowledge about the situation and the person you’re doing the reading for can be helpful as you may have additional information available to you.
If it’s a friend or family member, you may well already have a lot of knowledge and information about the background to both the situations and the people concerned. People you don’t know may also volunteer additional information. And of course, if the reading is for yourself, you will already know most of the background to things.
A BIG note of caution with this though: there is a danger, especially with family & friends, of imposing your wishes and judgements on someone else’s situation. Try to avoid this in a reading, stay as objective as you can and aim to deal mainly with known facts as much as possible.
As this is a friend, the additional facts I happen to know about this situation are:
- He is recently divorced after a family and long latterly-unhappy marriage & is on a process of self-discovery
- This is a romance of only a few month’s standing & his girlfriend is quite a bit younger
- It has been a very intense romance & he tells me it’s positive and joyous and they are absolutely in love
- She has told him she is certain he is The One for her
- A big issue, however has arisen about something that she wants in life that he has been clear that he absolutely does not
- There have been big emotional dramas & arguments on the trip in relation to this situation
- They have been mostly been staying with a lot of well-off friends of hers
- He is a person who is responsible in nature and takes his responsibilities to others seriously.
- I haven’t met her because the night before I visited the mutual friends where the couple were staying, they had had a huge argument & upset and she had gone to stay elsewhere.
- Several members of our normally welcoming friendship group have separately said they dislike this girlfriend
Click HERE to see the extra clarity that gives me on of the interpretation of the cards in the reading.
4. What Is Your Gut Instinct About What A Card Is Showing?
Do not underestimate this in a reading. Whether it be your intuition, a message from a higher power or a sense of “just knowing” something unconsciously. The human brain and senses are amazing things, and often you’ll find that a lot of intuition arises from unconscious bringing together of various bits of knowledge, things you are not necessarily sure about consciously. Sometimes this will also involve your own wisdom and experiences of life.
BUT you still need to be careful that you are not confusing your wishes with your gut instincts.
I tend to find this happens most often with readings I do for myself (obviously, if you know yourself well, not surprising) and if you’ve ever experienced it yourself in a reading, you’ll know it often comes with an “Aha” feeling (or occasionally, I’m afraid, a sinking one.). It’s when the meaning of a card seems to just jump out at you or when you find yourself focusing on it in a spread.
In this case, the card that did that for me was The Cross. It just gives me the biggest sense of heaviness and intensity, something that is slowing the movement of the Ship down. Coupled with the Stars, and given the situation, it’s almost as if it’s the weight of those hopes and dreams themselves, that idealism about the romance and what they both want it to be, that are weighing the whole thing down.
5. What is the Timeframe of the Reading?
We touched on this a little in the post about Dialling Meanings Up or Down. If you are reading for the longer term, you can afford for your interpretations to also be “bigger”: more fundamental or more dramatic.
The shorter the time period you are reading for, the more dialled down your meanings should be. If you specify a reading just for the day ahead, for instance, you can expect the meanings to be either basic or quite literal.
In this case, my reading is related mainly to the here and now of the situation but not necessarily just today. It does seem to be mainly covering events of this time period though, the length of the trip, I’d say. I think the meanings I’ve come up with are appropriate to this timeframe.
So in summary then, the 5 things to consider when deciding on the meanings of the cards in your readings are:
- Exact Context & Situation
- Exact Question You Asked
- What You Already Know About The Situation
- Your Gut Instincts About The Cards
- Timeframe Of The Reading
Want more info and guidance on Lenormand in general? Check out my Lenormand Tips page for answers to some common questions and issues, or why not sign up to my mailing list for a FREE downloadable Card Combinations e-book, my regular newsletter, tips and exclusive subscriber-only freebies!