What is a shadow card?

I have seen several threads where a shadow card is mentioned. What exactly is it and when and how to you pull a shadow card during a reading?

Hi, Vanny! Others' definitions might vary, but for me, the SC is the card at the bottom of the deck when I've laid out the cards for my reading. I use it often, though not all the time, and think of it as an underlying influence or as-yet-unseen force in the issue concerned. I lay it to one side when I've laid out the other cards. Sometimes I look at it straight away, sometimes I wait till the end of the reading.

HTH, \m/ Kat

Usually people refer to the card at the bottom of the deck as the "shadow." If you deal off the top, it's the very last card you'd draw.

Some people have strong ideas about the shadow card.

I use it once in a while. I don't have strong ideas about it; I don't have a theory about it.

When I use the shadow card, it happens like this: I'm reading the cards, and moving right along, and when I'm done, I just think to myself, "Hey. What's on the bottom, I wonder?"

Then I turn over the deck and see if anything happens in my brain. Sometimes yes, sometimes no!

Vanny said:

I have seen several threads where a shadow card is mentioned. What exactly is it and when and how to you pull a shadow card during a reading?

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I'll chime in because I'm strange. I actually "pull" a Shadow card in some readings. Though, it does come off the bottom of the deck, so it'd be the same card. If it's pulled, I read it as the shadow of the reading, as a reversed card. It is the "if everything goes wrong" or "what can make everything go wrong" or "what's the problem?" card, for me, basically. I do this for readings where there's no chance of reversal and I'm not considering elemental dignities.

But I don't think I'm 'traditional' in this manner.

I look at the 'bottom card' in every reading, but unless I pulled it as a shadow, I just consider it 'the road not taken.' After all, it is the last card, we chose not to pull.

What others call the shadow card, I call the unconscious card. It's the card at the bottom of the deck.

For me, it's the card that shows the unconscious/unknown forces at the heart of the query. I usually pull it if I need additional clarification. The only time I've pulled it deliberately was during the 2-card mini-CC exercises in the Tarot Games section.

T.

shadow card

Thank you for your responses. Next time I do a reading I might pull a shadow card and see what happens.