Guide to Your Tarot Year Card Part One

Find out how to calculate yours for 2023

Photo by author of Rider Waite Smith, Morgan Greer, and Eakins Tarot cards

She’s January 1st and she won’t reveal all her year’s secrets from the jump but we sure can suss out the big theme ahead for you using our best buddies, the cards of the Tarot.

I love a “card of the year” selection and while you can absolutely just pull one from the deck and declare that your omen, you can also rope numbers into this endeavor. If you can math, why not math? Let’s math.

Take the numerical form of your birth month — October = 10, for example — plus your birth day — let’s try on the 3rd — and add them together with the year; in this case, 2023.

So if your birthday is October 3rd and you’re looking into 2023:

10 + 3 + 2023 = 2036

Then add each digit together: 2 + 0 + 3 + 6 = 11

The goal is to wind up with a number between 1 and 21, as those correlate with the cards of the Major Arcana.

If your total was 22 or above, you’d add those digits together: 2 + 2 = 4

Now that you have a number between 1 and 21 — note that since no one will wind up with a zero, there’s no Fool year on tap — you can find the card that signifies the themes you’ll encounter in 2023.

Our October 3rd baby’s 11 year means she’s going to be under the influence of Justice. This card is ruled by Libra and represents the air element aspect of Venus: the blindfolded visionary and arbiter of what is just and fair.

We can interpret that our 10/3 is going to be subject to and an agent of this force field. She’ll examine relationships and transactions more closely; right wrongs and have wrongs righted on her behalf; gain immense mental clarity; surrender to any karma she has built up, meaning both paying her dues and receiving what she is owed; and experience the resolution of any legal battles in which she is personally or vicariously enmeshed.

In addition to checking out your Tarot card for the year, take a look at the one before (what you experienced last year) and the one up next (what you’ll encounter next year). This context can help you chart where you’ve come from and where you’re going; rather than seeing current events as somehow totally separate.