IS LENORMAND HARD?

Sometimes I'll get messages or emails from folks within the community or some thoughts from people in the Master Courses asking me if Lenormand is in fact hard and complicated to read. 

Specifically, they're concerned about whether Lenormand has rigid and specific rules that need to be followed. They might feel like there is something strict going on with Lenormand and it needs to be followed in a certain way. Is that true? In this video, I want to share with you my thoughts about this.

Hi, everyone. I'm Layla, the Lenormand Reader, and I've been reading Lenormand for over 20 years. If you aspire to master this practice, you have come to the right place. I offer one of the few end-to-end Master Program for Lenormand, specifically focused on the many techniques in this amazing practice. So be sure to check out the website and all of the links that I have in the description box for you so you can take advantage of all the resources that lunar reader offers. And please like and share this video so that more folks can be aware of the amazing Lenormand practice.

An email that I recently received from someone asking about whether Lenormand is hard and if it has specific rules that needs to be followed, is what motivated me to make this video. I get questions in the programs about this every so often and sometimes people within the community will reach out to me by email or through social media and ask me if Lenormand is in fact difficult.

So I want to spend a bit of time talking through why people might feel this way when they land on and begin to practice it.

LENORMAND IS DIFFERENT

As you might expect, I don't feel this way about Lenormand at all, and many others who practice Lenormand don't either. But I understand where people are coming from when they ask if Lenormand is rigid or if it has specific rules that need to be followed. And I want to articulate a little bit of what's going on behind the scenes when someone practicing Lenormand feels this way about it.

This usually happens only in the beginning when they're first getting to know the practice. Down the line, if they stick with it, they won't feel this way at all. So first, let's articulate what I think is going on when people feel this way about Lenormand.

This is how I see it. Most people come to Lenormand from a Tarot background or an Oracle cards background. They think that Lenormand is just another deck that you're going to read pretty much in the same way. But the truth is that it is not the same. Lenormand has big distinctions between it and other decks. The particularities of Lenormand are pretty much unique to it.

The way Lenormand is very distinct from other card decks and other methods is mainly in two ways that are closely related to each other:

These are the facts that (1) Lenormand’s cards are read in combinations. They are not read individually and are not interpreted individually in the way that they are in most other methods. And what this does is that (2) Lenormand layouts are very different from Tarot layouts and Oracle card layouts.

My favorite and go-to example for this is the Tarot horseshoe spread. This is a very popular spread. It's made up of 7 cars that are laid down in the form of a horseshoe. And each card and the horseshoe represents a certain aspect of the reading.

So you've got a past card, a present, and a future card, you have an obstacle card, other people, advice, and an outcome card. So each of these positions on the horseshoe spread correspond to these areas of the reading. And so you draw one card per position and you interpret that card for that position.

This is not how Lenormand works at all. Yes, you can use a horseshoe spread with Lenormand and read it in the same way as you would with the Tarot, but that's not really the Lenormand way. That's not really doing Lenormand.

The way you do Lenormand is by having Tableau-style layouts where you've got quite a few cards laid out in a geometric configuration, and you read the cards in different lines, rows and columns and diagonals as well as other structures. So there's a whole lot of techniques that are completely new. 

When it comes to reading Tableau-style layouts, people feel that there are a whole lot of rules that they need to learn about in order to be able to interpret the Tableau successfully. Whereas initially they might have expected that it's going to be one card per position in a layout, like a horseshoe spread or a Celtic cross and other layouts that are common with the Tarot and other card decks.

But that's not the way Lenormand is. Lenormand layouts are Tableau-style layouts. This is the classical way of reading Lenormand and this is what people aspire to be able to read when they work with the deck.

But I feel that the truth is not so much that there are ‘rules’ to read a Tableau. Yes, you need to read the lines, and as many of them as you can, to put together a nice story. And yes, you need to be able to interpret the cards in combinations for a specific context or for a question. And so that's what comes across as the rules.

But I think what's really happening here is that the expectation that people have of how to read Lenormand is challenged when they discover what Lenormand is really about.

So in a way, it's like they have to come back to square one and rediscover a practice. They sort of have to do away with what they know from the Tarot and Oracle cards in order to more or less start from scratch with Lenormand and get a sense of what is combinations and Tableau-style layouts are about.

So that's what I feel is happening here, not so much that there are rules, but the idea that people's expectations about Lenormand are challenged. They feel like they need to step back and relearn a few things.

And also, the differences between Tarot or other decks and Lenormand is not shallow. It is not a superficial difference like you have to read the cards a little bit differently or the cards mean this or that a little bit differently.

The difference between the two has quite a bit of depth. The idea of weaving cards together in combinations and in Tableau-style readings are quite a big universe of interpretive imagination and skills, that are not really found in other practices and decks. I think it is very unique to Lenormand, and I think it is very much the appeal of Lenormand and why people want to get into it.

It is not just about the deck and Tableau layouts, but also about the way our interpretation skills grow, the way the interpretive imagination is stretched, and all of these amazing things that you can get out of a Tableau-style reading that appeals to those pursuing Lenormand.

LENORMAND HAS FEWER RESOURCES

Another reason that I think people might feel there are rules and it seems complicated to go about Lenormand is because the Lenormand world is much smaller than the Tarot world, oracle cards, and even other divination practices. Lenormand is very niche. I think it deserves a lot more attention and it deserves to become more mainstream, but that's where it is right now.

And so as a result, there isn't really a main way, a standard way, or a commonly known way of doing Lenormand. Most people have to look all over the place for bits and pieces of the practice.

There is a lot of variety between Lenormand authors, which I think is a great thing, but people end up having to piecing the Lenormand world together. And so they might get stuck with, well, how do you do this or that? What do you read in a Tableau? Is there a logical way to go about reading the many things that you can in a Tableau?

This is actually the main reason I started Lenormand Reader, because I went through the same obstacles when I was building my practice, and I couldn't really figure out what was right, what wasn't right.

I felt there were some contradictions with the way cards were interpreted, combinations were made sense of, and techniques were applied on Tableaus and other layouts.

That is really what motivated me to put together the richness of the Lenormand world into a coherent whole, so that people can save themselves the trouble of experimenting and spending a whole lot of time trying to piece together what doesn't always make sense.

So I feel the obstacle of understanding Lenormand and the choppiness of the Lenormand world could also affect how people perceive Lenormand, if it has rules, if it is rigid, or if it has to be done in a certain way.

I don't think this is as significant as the genuinely unique features of Lenormand - the card combinations and the Tableau-style layouts - but I still think the choppiness of the Lenormand world and the fact that people need to try to put things together can affect how they perceive it and confuse them.

So these are my thoughts about why I think people might feel that Lenormand is complicated or if it has certain rules and you need to get your head around them.

What you are actually getting your head around is the unique features of Lenormand, and piecing together what might be a not-so-coherent set of techniques to do a good reading with Lenormand.

Why don't you leave me your comment or your thoughts about what you think of this? Did you feel like Lenormand has rules that need to be followed? Did you get past this? And tell me a little bit about where you're at in your journey.

With that said, I want to share with you why I think Lenormand is actually really accessible and very enjoyable.

LENORMAND IS MORE ACCESSIBLE THAN WE MIGHT THINK

For starters, Lenormand is a very small deck. It has only 36 cards. This is much smaller than the 78 card Tarot deck and other Oracle decks. And in the Tarot, you read cards both upright and reversed. So that's plenty to learn. Whereas with Lenormand, it's just 36 cards. So from the get-go, there's fewer cards to go through. 

The second feature of Lenormand's deck that makes it very accessible is that the symbols on the cards are everyday symbols. Most cards are very easy to resonate with. They are from everyday life and we already have existing associations with the cards.

Symbols like the Clover, the Sun, the Whip, the Coffin, are very easy to make sense of. And from there, it's easy to expand on the ideas of what the cards mean. There are a few cards that come across as we say mute, but really, once you've made up your mind about them in some workshops I've covered techniques for how to get around mute cards.

You overcome the initial muteness of the card and with practice, you decide what it means and you see how it works in a reading. So you overcome that initial aspect.

There are very few mute cards as far as I felt when I started out with the deck, but you let me know what you think are the mute cards and what you've done to overcome this initial muteness, and what you did to make more sense of the cards.

This is different from the Tarot cards which have a lot more esoteric meanings, a lot more occult associations, and bigger systems, spiritual systems like the Kabbalah, that are associated with the Tarot’s cards. So when you first learn the Tarot, you also need to learn this language before you can read the cards effectively in a reading.

Not so with Lenormand. There is a much more immediate connection with what Lenormand’s cards mean because its symbols come from everyday life.

Admittedly, reading a Grand Tableau is not the easiest thing to do, but it does become one of the most enjoyable experiences within Lenormand. And I think it is really the reason why people end up committing to the practice and learning everything they can about it - to get these beautiful readings through a Grand Tableau.

This ties back into what I was saying initially about these genuinely unique features of the idea of reading lines in a Tableau or in a Tableau-style layout and putting the story together. And it's not just lines in a Tableau, but there are many other structures that we can dig out of this amazing spread to get a whole lot of amazing insights for the reader.

Once you're familiar with card combinations and you're comfortable weaving lines together in a sentence, the Tableau just falls into place and it becomes easy, and it can even become addictive to just want to dig out all of these amazing insights from this amazing spread.

So these are my thoughts about why some people might feel that Lenormand is complicated or has rules. And these are my thoughts about how you can overcome them once you become familiar with what is genuinely unique to Lenormand.

So again, I feel it comes down to the expectations that people might have of the Lenormand practice. This expectation is challenged, so they feel like they need to take a step back and rewire their minds around the practice. But once you're past this, once you've discovered what Lenormand is really about, it becomes a really enjoyable practice. Pondering these big spreads like the Tableau and digging out all sorts of amazing insights for your reading or for your client readings.

I never want you to be stuck with Lenormand. I am confident that once you’re past this initial learning curve and you discover what Lenormand is really about, you are going to love it and you are going to keep doing it, digging out all of these amazing insights from your Tableaus and your Tableau-style layouts. Always reach out to me, let me know how you're doing with your journey and keep me updated about the amazing insights that you're getting from your readings.

If you're excited about the amazing Lenormand, then I invite you to explore all the resources that Lenormand Reader has for you. You might know that I offer one of the only end-to-end Programs to master Lenormand. So be sure to explore the website and the links that I have for you in the description box. And I have made it my mission to create comprehensive resources for Lenormand no matter where you are in your journey, whether you're just getting started or you're ready to go pro. So be sure to check out the Lenormand Reader website and all of the resources that are on there.

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