Yes, I use cold reading all the time. Long post ahead.
I haven't read Ian Rowland's books yet but I can say that in general magicians are not a great source for learning how to cold read. Too many of them are "skeptical" (honestly, cynical would be a more accurate word) and they treat it as if it's just a trick. The problem is, a trick is basically a set of steps that will always work if you follow them to a particular result. So they teach you to memorize Barnum Statements and other short cuts, and they think an audience will feel the same way with these generic statements as they do when someone says something that feels truly personal.
Cold reading is simply making guesses and honing in on the ones that the audience reacts to favorably. Which makes it more of a system than a trick.
The big thing is - you already cold read every day, all day. When you're driving and you think, "That person is going to pull out in front of me, I should slow down" and they do. Or, "That guy at the bar is about to start a fight", or "I bet this guy with the t-shirt likes this kind of music". If you've ever said something like, "You strike me as the kind of person that does Cross Fit" or whatever. What's happening there is your unconscious mind is processing information in the background and spitting out little conclusions based on those unconscious observations.
There's nothing supernatural about it, and it can absolutely be trained.
So, I have three pieces of advice on how to train cold reading.
1) Learn trivia. Lots and lots of trivia about lots and lots of subjects. The more information you have in your brain, the more information your unconscious mind can use to make those conclusions for you.
I'm reminded of an interview with Paul Draper. He was talking about meeting Max Maven, and Paul asked him, "How do I become a better mentalist?" And Maven responded, "Read everything." To which Paul said, "What do you mean? I should read fiction? Non fiction? History? Science?", and Maven said, "If I had needed more words, I would have used them."
2) The only shortcut to learning how to cold read is to cold read a lot. The easiest way to do this is to use an oracle system at first. Personally, when I do oracle readings I use either the major arcana of a Tarot deck or an oracle deck, depending on what mood I'm in or what fits the event. When you get a deck, read the keywords of the major cards. For Tarot decks that's the 22 major arcana. You can also use the full 72 card deck but for me that has never been necessary. For oracle cards it will probably only be 20-30 cards and each one will have a specific meaning. Just worry about the keywords to use as a basis. Then, using the cards, do as many readings as you can. You can just throw a party and say you'll be trying to do reading while people hang out. Don't make it a serious thing at first, just a fun little thing you're doing in addition to other stuff.
Now the key here is to use the images on the cards to inspire your intuition. Just start telling a story. "This card is the Fool, it usually means the start of a journey and innocence. But I'm being drawn to this little dog here off to the side - a dog indicates loyalty and protectiveness, and I feel like you've recently had a situation where that was a prominent issue - does that make sense?" Basically you just say whatever pops into your head and then confirm with the sitter, allowing them to explain to you what you're saying. Then with the next card you build on that, and then next card builds on that, and so on. Until you have essentially a story laid out in front of you that the sitter has basically told you what it is so it has to be correct. Then you recap with the main points of that story, and leave out any "misses". This will basically cement only the hits in the sitter's mind.
The more you do that, the more often your unconscious mind will start drawing those conclusions that you can't consciously come up with. When those pop into your head, just say them. "I don't know why, but I'm getting the sense that you play basketball? Is that true?" Very often these will be accurate, and when they're not you've already given the caveat, "I don't know why I'm thinking this".
And lastly - 3) Learn to observe. Ben Cardall wrote a book that has a lot dedicated to this, but you can learn it by just practicing. Most people do not observe their surroundings very well, so when you learn to be observant it genuinely seems like a super power. Like that show, Psyche, when the dad makes the main character tell him how many hats are in the room, how many people are reading newspapers, etc. without looking around the moment he's asked. Neurodivergent people are often naturally good at this because they can't focus on one thing so they're looking around all the time. The key is to not just look around aimlessly but actually pay attention to what you're seeing.
Observation, combined with the trivia, will allow you to draw conclusions. Doing oracle readings trains your unconscious mind to give those conclusions to your conscious mind. After enough time of doing all that you won't need oracle cards any more and you can just observe a person and tell them about themselves.
