About Larisa: Tarot Reader, Astrologer and Dream Interpreter

A journey that began in a bookshop window

One day I saw a tarot deck in a bookshop window. Until then I knew nothing about tarot. But the moment I saw that deck, a very clear voice spoke inside me: “You should buy this deck and learn it.” I didn’t know why. I simply listened to that voice and bought the deck.

After that, a completely different journey began for me. First I started learning the cards and their basic meanings. But over time I realised that this was far more than memorising a few symbols on the cards. I researched the mythological stories, the astrological links, the esoteric symbols and the archetypes behind every card. One symbol led me to another, one story to an ancient teaching. The more I learned, the more tarot stopped being just a deck for me; it became a symbolic language that opens layer by layer.

Along the way I had no teacher to guide me and no one walking beside me. I learned without anyone’s support, by following my own curiosity. From the very beginning, the only thing I followed was the inner voice I first heard that day at the bookshop window.

Over time I also took a range of courses, but I learned most from the experience I gained over the years and from continuous practice. Looking back today, I see that my journey with tarot began with a decision to listen to my own inner voice when I saw that deck.

What I work with today

Tarot and Katina. I have read tarot and Katina side by side since I began, about four years ago. I read with the Rider–Waite deck, the Katina deck and my own deck, Larisa; the tarot card images here come from the Larisa deck.
Astrology. I am a karmic and esoteric astrologer and I read birth charts. When I read the cards, I bring their planetary and zodiac links into the reading too. I read a birth chart as a person’s whole story, considering character, strengths and shadow, relationships, fears, potential and recurring life themes together.
Dreams. I interpret dreams and give subconscious readings, approaching dreams symbolically, psychologically and esoterically.
Languages. I work in Turkish and Russian.

How I read the cards

I describe myself as a reader who combines intuition with knowledge and the experience gained over the years. I read the cards not only by their classic meanings but together with their mythological, astrological and esoteric symbols, and my aim is to bring out the truth behind what is visible and the real dynamics beneath events.

For me, tarot is at heart a reading of the subconscious. Through the cards I try to read a person’s suppressed feelings, fears, desires and relationship patterns, and sometimes inner processes they are not yet aware of themselves.

That is why tarot, for me, is not only a tool that answers the question “What will happen?”. I look more at the questions “Why is this happening?”, “What lies beneath this situation?”, “What does the person really feel?” and “Which dynamic is at work on the unseen side?”.

Tarot is not a tool that tells the future with certainty or announces an unchangeable fate; for me it is a tool for guidance. The cards make visible the possibilities that may unfold if current conditions continue, and the points a person may not yet see. I read a reversed card according to the situation, because it does not always mean the same thing. And Katina, for me, is on the whole more about relationships.

Hard cards and relationship questions

When Death, the Tower or the Devil appears, I don’t read it as a sign of certain disaster. I read Death not as physical death but as the close of a chapter, transformation and leaving the old behind; the Tower as sudden realisations, a shaken order or the change of a structure that is no longer sound; the Devil through addictions, obsessions, unhealthy bonds, control and our shadow sides. My aim is awareness, not fear.

In relationship questions I don’t build a reading only on “do they love me or not?”. I weigh both people’s view of each other, their feelings and intentions, the dynamic between them and anything left unsaid or hidden, as a whole. What matters to me is understanding why the relationship is where it is and where it is heading.

What I don’t read for

I don’t ask the cards about health, death, legal matters or investments. My readings start from a different question: not “what will happen?” but “why is this happening?” and “what lies underneath this situation?”

My three tips for beginners

Get to know the cards. Instead of trying to memorise their meanings, notice the symbols, colours and figures on a card and the first feeling it stirs in you. Learn the book meanings, but over time let your own intuition into the reading too.
Don’t push the deck. Don’t draw cards for the same question again and again, and don’t keep going until you hear the answer you want. Remember that it can be harder to look at your own spread objectively when you feel strongly about something.
Don’t label a single card as good or bad. The language of tarot is a whole. To understand a card, look at the cards beside it, the question and the overall story of the spread. For me, that is exactly where real tarot practice begins.

You can see these tips in practice in tarot for beginners and how to read tarot cards.

If you are here for the first time

Welcome. If you are here for the first time, this is what I would like you to know first: my aim here is not to draw a fixed fate for you, but to help you see your situation from a different angle, notice the details you may have missed and weigh your own path more consciously. Sometimes what we are really looking for is not the future, but the truth you cannot see right now.

How I read relationship compatibility

When I read synastry charts, I look beyond “Are we compatible?” or “Is there a relationship here?” I try to understand which emotions two people bring out in each other, where their attraction comes from, the roots of their conflicts, their attachment patterns and what the relationship teaches both of them.

Rather than listing planetary aspects one by one, I read the relationship’s whole story. I take the shadow into account alongside love, and I consider passion, fear, karma and transformation as parts of that story. My focus is on understanding the relationship as a whole and what both people experience within it.