Spreads for Personal Transformation

A wonderful way to learn the symbology of tarot and each card's many nuances is to pull a single card each day. Simply shuffle, divide the deck in whatever manner you generally prefer, then pull one single card. Study or mediate on the card. Note what comes to your mind first in a tarot journal (a simple notebook works), and see how the card may be pointing at certain aspects of your personality or mind set.

Next, look the card up in the book that came with the deck, read through other books you have on hand, and do a Web search for that card. Learn as much about each card as you pull one a day. At the end of each day, see if any of the card's symbology or definitions had relevance or meaning for that day.

Using the Devil to meditate on can help us get to our shadow aspects, learn to come to terms with traits in ourselves that we despise and try to forget. As you learn more and more about each single card through a single daily spread, you'll discover cards that symbolize aspects of yourself that you'd like to improve. Find time to focus on those special cards.

Daily Two-Card Spread — The two-card spread is also great for daily readings. For this spread you might want to ask a question to focus on, such as

• What should my focus today be, and what will challenge me?
• What area of my life needs attention, and what part of that poses a challenge?

These types of two-part questions define the positions of the spread. I find that wording the question in that way helps for figuring out what the cards are suggesting when you do the reading. Again focus on first impressions, then author intended meanings, and book definitions.

3-Card Story Spread — This spread is both fun and challenging. Ask and concentrate on a single question while shuffling and dividing, then pull three cards. This time the positions are not assigned, but are instead read together. You may need to study each individual card for a while, and look up each in your book or online references, then see how the cards merge for greater meaning. I have noticed that very often one card seems to advise while the others define the problem. Some kinds of questions you might ask for this kind of spread:

• How can I improve my relationship with (name inserted here)?
• What areas do I need to work on so my job is more fulfilling?
• What am I doing to attract negative people in my life?

These kinds of questions beg for definition of the problem as well as advice for finding a solution, and your subconscious will deliver.

Strength Spread — This is a wonderful spread to repeat a few times a year to gauge your personal areas of growth, and how you need to refocus. You could also use this spread in other ways to assess your weaknesses, your talents, etc.

In this spread each card position is assigned a question. The card in that position answers that specific question only, though you may find that together they also provide useful information. Shuffle and cut as usual while concentrating on the general question: Where do my strengths lie?. Read the other questions as you shuffle and keep them in your mind as well. Pull five cards, either from the top of the deck or by fanning. First card pulled goes in position 1, the second in position 2 and so forth.

Position assignments:

• 1: What is my greatest strength?
• 2: How can I enhance this strength?
• 3: Where should I apply this strength in my life?
• 4: What does this strength bring me?
• 5: How my strength challenges me?

Be sure to put this reading in your notebook to refer to, then in a few months do a comparison reading to refocus.