The Chakra Tune Up: Using the Tarot as a Tool of Healing

Align Your Chakras With the Cards

The Tarot, long a powerful tool of divination, can also be used as a dramatic tool of healing, and for shifting deep patterns. The deck that I suggest for this—the Rider-Waite—is perhaps the most well known deck in the Western world. Created by Dr. Arthur Edward Waite (1857-1942), a scholar of occultism, and illustrated by Pamela Coleman Smith, a theatrical designer and American member of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, it is the “standard” teaching deck, and the first to use detailed illustrations of the Minor Arcana, not just the Major.

The Deck Itself

The 78 cards of the Tarot deck are divided into two groups: 22 Major Arcana and 56 Minor Arcana cards, made up of pip or suit cards (1-10), as well as court cards, which more or less correspond with traditional playing cards. The meanings of the Major Arcana are generally considered more far-reaching, relating to our journey for meaning and enlightenment, while the minors are considered more transient, representative of day-to-day activities.
The Seven Chakras

Using both the structure of the seven chakras and the images of the Rider-Waite deck, the chakra lube job illustrates how the cards of a layout may be replaced as the healing progresses; as the images shift, they actually depict the process of growth and resolution, similar to time-elapsed photography.

The term chakra is the Sanskrit word for wheel, and refers to our own energy system: the interface between our energetic and physical selves, our body and consciousness. Just as the car’s engine requires regular maintenance, the chakras, too, require regular “tune ups.” This not only keeps its system running smoothly, but addresses any blocks or problems on the core level.

While the chakras can be “tuned-up” through meditation, energy work with light, sound, color, crystals, singing bowls, musical instruments and others, the method which I’ve created and coined is known as the chakra lube job.

The chakras, one through seven, are: #1, the root, at the base of the spine, which relates to our ability to prosper and thrive on the earth; #2, the sacrum relates to our ability to gratify ourselves; #3, the solar plexus addresses our own personal power and capacity to be comfortable in our skin; #4, the heart preserves unconditional love, and the integration of all polarities; #5, the throat, the center of the seven, is self expression; #6, the Third Eye, our ability to see the big picture and our psychic center; and, #7, the Crown, at the top of the head, is our connection to the universal, wisdom and bliss.