Attention & Focus · “You Become What You Hold”
The Tarot Contemplation Ritual
Train sustained one-pointed attention and trust in subtle impressions by silently contemplating a single Tarot trump each day, then recording whatever feelings, sensations, or ideas arise — building the receptivity and self-observation the rest of the course depends on.
Tarot Contemplation Ritual: Pull the 22 Majors; set aside #6, 7, 10, 13, 15, 18 (work with the remaining 16). Relax (golden-light ritual). Shuffle until it “feels time to stop” (or after ~1 min). Draw one card and gaze at its picture for up to 3 minutes — just look, don’t interpret. Three deep breaths to close. In your Magickal Diary, note the card’s name/number and any feelings, sensations, or ideas that came. Daily.
What it is
In Lesson One of Modern Magick — the most widely used English course in Western ceremonial magic — Donald Michael Kraig gives the beginner three daily practices to run from day one: the Relaxation Ritual, the Magickal Diary, and the Tarot Contemplation Ritual.
The Contemplation Ritual is the gentlest possible introduction to symbol-work: you relax, shuffle a reduced deck of Major Arcana cards until something says stop, draw one, and simply look at its picture for no more than three minutes, noticing whatever rises in you.
Then you write it down. There is no fortune-telling, no memorised meanings, no “reading.” Kraig’s aim is to train sustained attention on a single rich image and to teach the student to notice and trust subtle inner impressions — the two faculties the entire later course (pathworking, evocation, visualisation) is built on.
The Method
From Modern Magick, Lesson One (and Kraig’s own Llewellyn-Journal write-up of the same ritual):
- Prepare the deck. Take the 22 cards of the Major Arcana out of a Tarot deck. From those, set aside six cards — numbers 6, 7, 10, 13, 15, and 18 (the Lovers, the Chariot, the Wheel, Death, the Devil, the Moon). This leaves 16 cards for the ritual. (Kraig holds the set-aside six for later, more advanced work; the beginner contemplates only the remaining sixteen.)
- Relax first. “ Perform the relaxation ritual“ — his golden-light progressive relaxation — to settle into a calm, receptive state before contemplating.
- Shuffle until it feels right. “ Mix them up (shuffle them) in any manner you desire until you get a feeling it is time to stop.“ The feeling can be very subtle; if you sense nothing, simply stop after about one minute.
- Draw one and gaze. “ Select any one card and look at the picture on it for no more than three minutes.“ This soft, unforced gazing at the single image is the whole core of the practice. Don’t analyse or recall book-meanings — just look, and let the picture work on you.
- Close with three breaths. “ Take three deep breaths and the Tarot contemplation ritual is complete.“
- Record it. In your Magickal Diary, “ record the card name and number,” and “ any feelings, sensations, or ideas you received while looking at (contemplating) the card.“ Over weeks, the diary becomes the real teacher — you watch your responses to the symbols deepen and change. Kraig has the student do this daily, alongside the Relaxation Ritual (and, once introduced in Lesson Three, the LBRP), as a standing part of the morning/evening routine. (Sourcing note: the deck reduction, the set-aside numbers 6/7/10/13/15/18, the “shuffle until it feels time to stop,” the three-minute cap, the three-breath close, and the diary-recording step are all Kraig’s documented instructions. Short quoted phrases are verbatim; the rest is faithful paraphrase.)
Source & Lineage
The ritual opens Lesson One of Donald Michael Kraig’s Modern Magick (Llewellyn, 1988; expanded Twelve Lessons ed., 2010).
Kraig (1951-2014) taught the material in classes for a decade before writing it as a complete graded curriculum for the solitary student. The practice draws on the Golden Dawn tradition of meditating on Tarot trumps as gateways to their symbolic worlds (later formalised in the course as full pathworking), but the simple beginner form — reduced deck, shuffle-by-feel, three-minute gaze, diary entry — is Kraig’s own pedagogical on-ramp. → (Donald Michael Kraig node); related: (the relaxation it opens with).
The Traditions' versions
Trataka (yogic gazing) — steady single-point gazing (candle, symbol, image) to still and concentrate the mind; structurally the same attention-training core.
- Pathworking (Golden Dawn / later in Kraig’s own course) — entering the Tarot/Tree image in imagination and journeying within it; the Contemplation Ritual is its quiet seed. → pathworking entries.
- Lectio / visio divina — contemplative dwelling on a sacred image or text, receiving rather than analysing.
- Active imagination (Jung) — attend to an inner image, let it move, record the dialogue; the diary step parallels this.
- Mandala / icon contemplation — sustained absorbed gazing on a symbol-rich image as a focusing and self-revealing practice.
Common refinements
Trying to “read” the card. The error that defeats the exercise. Don’t recall meanings or predict — just look and notice what arises. Interpretation is a different skill taught later.
- Gazing too long. Kraig caps it at three minutes; pushing past it strains the eyes and the mind wanders. Stop on time.
- Skipping the relaxation. Contemplating while keyed-up gives thin, jittery impressions. Settle first.
- Not recording — or recording only the card. The diary entry (feelings/sensations/ideas) is where the learning lives; skipping it wastes the session.
- Forcing the “stop” feeling. If nothing comes, stop after a minute. Don’t manufacture a mystical signal.
- Including the wrong cards. Use only the 16 — keep 6, 7, 10, 13, 15, 18 aside for the beginner stage as Kraig directs.