The Art of the Custom Tarot Spread

By Ian Bryant


Introduction


Pretty much anyone who has purchased a tarot deck released by one of the larger commercial publishers is familiar with spreads like the Celtic Cross.  There’s a host of spreads we’ve all learned and become familiar with thanks to the Little White Book (LWB) in each of these decks that often have at least one of the same spreads we’ve seen in other LWBs or in many of the popular books on tarot reading and spreads.  At some point in a tarot reader’s career, or someone just reading for themselves or for friends, a moment arrives where the question is asked “Do I have to use someone else’s tarot spread?”  If you are one of those brave souls that is fine with questioning convention and breaking rules, the answer is most definitely “No!”  But understandably many are a little more timid when it comes to shifting from convention, especially when you aren’t sure how those popular spreads were originally made.  Rather than trying to answer the big questions here, I hope I can at least inject a little bravery into your own desire to make that leap into creative tarot work and creating your first custom spread.  In this article I’m using the ShadowFox Tarot by  Richard & Jennifer ShadowFox, published 2010 by Schiffer Publishing, Ltd. who also were kind enough to supply me with a copy for review.     


My Foray Into Custom Tarot Spreads


At the most basic level a tarot spread seeks to answer a question or questions raised by a querent, whomever comes to the tarot for a response.  If you’ve looked at the Celtic Cross tarot spread or other popular spreads, you’ve probably seen a card identified as the Significator.  This typically refers to the querent or the issue being brought to the tarot.  Many smaller spreads like the popular Past-Present-Future don’t have this card and, frankly, don’t need it.  

Now, some might wonder at more complicated spreads, like the one found in the LWB for Aleister Crowley’s Thoth tarot deck.  Keep in mind, tarot traditions like The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn often are built upon complex relationships in the cards between assigned astrological signs and numerological values found in the Kabbalah and assigned to cards, typically the Major Arcana.  In other words if you’re looking to take your first step into creating a spread that works for you perhaps reflecting too deeply on spreads like that described for the Thoth Tarot might not be the best first model.

My first attempt at a custom tarot spread is actually not the one pictured above, the Tranquility Spread published in the July issue of Tarot Sushi.  When I first decided I wanted to take a stab at  creating a custom spread, I did exactly the opposite of what I’m recommending here and dove deep into the rabbit hole of Kabbalah, astrological correspondences and numerology.  I read Israel Regardie, Aleister Crowley, Gareth Knight, Phyllis Seckler and Dion Fortune.  I ended up with a spread so complex (and likely flawed) that I had forgotten the very basics of what I was trying to accomplish - answer a simple question.  How did I fix this problem?  I asked myself the following questions:

  1. Why do I use tarot cards?
  2. What do I hope to accomplish by asking the tarot cards a question?
  3. Am I doing this for myself or for others as well?

Once I had answered these questions adequately, I did some research outside of tarot and came across some literature on “Dhyana,” a four-stage form of mediation to aid in withdrawing from automatic responses to input from the senses that ultimately leads to a state of awareness, mindfulness and detachment.  I was fascinated by this and the stages seemed like a perfect candidate for a four-card tarot spread which became:

  1. Seclusion -  From what do I need to seclude myself? 
  2. Concentration - What thoughts and ideas do I need to take control over?
  3. Detachment - What physical pleasures and sensations dominate me?
  4. Equanimity - What hidden factors are preventing me from composure and tranquility?

The tarot deck now became almost oracle-like as I shuffled and lay out four cards in a shape that I imagined represented my initial position coming to the cards with my question [1], humbling myself a little in admission that I had a flaw I needed to work on [2], rising a bit in identifying one flaw but then encountering another [3], and then descending well below where I started as I dealt with the final issue and hopefully entered into some state of tranquility.  Thus,  I used the spread to answer questions but also to attempt to do the actual work of Dhyana.

Here is the anatomy of a custom tarot spread, fearless and free, separated from the crowd and willing to take inspiration from whatever feels right in the research of “what is the question?”  In this case I was inspired by the diversity of tarot decks available, and when I asked myself why I turned to them, the answer was diversity and multicultural knowledge.  What I hoped to accomplish was self-improvement and perhaps to give back in some way.  By releasing myself from esoteric traditions I was better able to compose a custom tarot spread that would work for me and, hopefully, others.  This doesn’t mean esoteric tarot has no place in custom spreads, quite the opposite.  However, custom tarot spreads for esoteric and ritual purposes is another article altogether.    


Creating Your Own Spread


ShadowFox Tarot © Richard & Jennifer ShadowFox, Published by Schiffer Publishing, Ltd. 2010


Let’s say you’re ready to jump into creating your own tarot spread and have now answered some of those key questions such as the ones I had to answer for myself.  You decide to take your favorite tarot deck and begin the process.  Outside of those key questions, what are some other things you should consider?  Happily, the deck I chose to use in creating my Tranquility Spread worked well with my Dhyana model.  However, I did read the book that came with the deck and tried several readings to see if indeed the spread worked with the card meanings, and then tried a few other decks as well before finalizing the spread as it appeared in Tarot Sushi.  Some of the questions you may want to explore as you create your spread may include:

  1. Do I need a Significator card?
  2. How many cards do I actually need to achieve a reasonable reading?
  3. Does my deck contain correspondences such as astrological, Kabbalistic, or Jungian that are inseparable from the way the cards are read?
  4. Is the art in my deck at odds with the way the tarot spread is being phrased?
  5. Is there already a spread out there that accomplishes what I’m trying to achieve? 

Since we’ll address question #5 in the last section below, let’s use the spread above illustrated with the ShadowFox Tarot as an example.  First, the spread creator decides “yes, I need a significator card to help guide this type of reading” and sets the position for that card (typically pulled before the actual reading) at the front of the spread.  Next, the spread creator identifies four cards that are needed to ask a question that deals with two relationships and how they affect one another.  Examples could include Mother-Daughter & Father-Daughter, Wife-Husband & Wife-Ex-Husband, and so on.  The spread creator identifies the core structure as follows:

  1. Card #1 - Significator (Emperor)
  2. Cards #2 & #3 - Relationship #1 (King & Queen of Pentacles)
  3. Cards #4 & #5 - Relationship #2 (6 of Pentacles & Chariot)

Once the layout is settled on, the question format is solidified.  One example could be “Why am I having so much trouble connecting with my oldest daughter, while my relationship with my youngest daughter is healthy?”  Another might be “My husband and I are fighting with another couple who used to be good friends; what could be the issue?”  Note that in each relationship set it’s not specified which card represents the querent, or represents which part of a couple that may not include the querent.  Having this open reading might be beneficial depending on the Significator card and to which of the two cards in a relationship set rings most true for the querent.

In answer to questions #3 and #4 from our spread checklist, we take a closer look at the book and deck we plan to use.  In this case, the ShadowFox Tarot has a rather deep accompanying book written by Richard and Jennifer ShadowFox that seems daunting at first.  Card associations described include alchemical, astrological, numerological, elemental, I-Ching, Hebrew and herbal.  As packed as it is, in fact the deck is based visually on the familiar imagery of the Rider-Waite-Smith tarot deck, and the signature spread suggested for use with the deck is the familiar Celtic Cross tarot spread.  In shuffling through the cards, they clearly are not bound to symbolism that would prevent answering questions of the type in the custom spread.

And finally, some basic research into relationship spreads that would include a Significator and two sets of cards representing couples/friends/family/etc reveals no spreads that leap out as identical.  It’s safe to say this spread creator has a starting point to charge ahead and iron out any issues before publishing it or using it with clients.      

Building Off Existing Spreads


ShadowFox Tarot © Richard & Jennifer ShadowFox, Published by Schiffer Publishing, Ltd. 2010


I hope this brief article on how I have approached creating custom spreads has been of some use to you.  Before I leave you, however, here’s a quick note on building off someone else’s spread.  Sometimes the fear of diving into your own spread is too much but you’ve been using a popular spread for a while and wish there was that one extra card you could leverage for whatever reason.  I had a similar urge recently when using my Tranquility Spread after having worked with it a while.  Curious about learning more about Dhyana and realizing I had obtained an abbreviated and Westernized definition of it, I began to read more.  Following the four states I had used to model my spread on were another four called Arupas which sometimes are written to follow Dhyana, so states 5-8.  This perturbed me and caused me to take out my spread and see how I could either add to it, or create another one for extended mediation.  All I wound up doing was adding a Significator (the Hierophant above) to give me a more solid starting point and focal point of mediation as I attempted to move through each of the four states.  However, this then allowed me a jumping point if I wanted it to move to a second spread containing the four Arupas.  

While my example is perhaps different than what you may be designing your spread for (feel free to create spreads for mediation or self-reflection), keep in mind that sometimes having a spread already constructed and familiar is a good base to build from if you’re nervous about creating one from scratch.  Also, this gives you something to research in terms of how it was made, what the correspondences are within it and see how other readers have utilized it either as-is or how they may have modified it to their own needs.

However you take your first steps into tarot spread customization, I wish you well and I hope I have inspired you to take that leap.      


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