This in-depth eight-card layout shows various aspects of your personal journey. It is good for exploring generalised personal questions, but can also be used to explore relationships if the couple is viewed as a whole.
This spread progresses through eight stages similar to the tarot deck's Major Arcana, beginning with birth and the realm of fertility. After birth comes the initial growth which leads to a period of adaptation, change, and re-balancing oneself. Once the process has grown enough, security comes into focus, as it is necessary to protect what has been earned. After this, once again growth is important, but concerning the mind and creativitity this time, leading to another phase of personal changes. Finally upon completion of the journey, the rewards become evident, and beyond that, one's spiritual development level will have noticeably risen.
| Matters of Completion, Rewards and Luck.  4 of Wands |
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Matters of Change and Metamorphosis. King of Swords |
Matters of Inner Strength and Spiritual Guidance. The Devil |
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Matters of Learning, Art and Creativity. Queen of Pentacles |
Matters of Beginnings, fertility and birth. 8 of Swords |
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Matters of Protection and Defense. 9 of Swords |
Matters of Growth, Flow and Energy. 8 of Wands |
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Matters of Changes, Polarities and Balance. King of Cups |
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Matters of Beginnings, fertility and birth.
A woman, blindfolded and bound, with the swords of the card around her. Yet it is rather a card of temporary endurance than of irretrievable bondage.
Upright Meaning:
Bad news, violent chagrin, crisis, censure, power in trammels, conflict, calumny, sickness, having one's hands tied, insanity.
The card represents motion through the immovable – a flight of wands through an open country; but they draw to the term of their course. That which they signify is at hand; it may be even on the threshold.
Reversed Meaning:
Arrows of jealousy, internal dispute, stinging of conscience, quarrels, domestic disputes for married people.
He holds a short sceptre in his left hand and a great cup in his right; his throne is set upon the sea; on one side a ship is riding and on the other a dolphin is leaping.
Reversed Meaning:
Dishonest, double-dealing man; roguery, exaction, injustice, vice, scandal, pillage, considerable loss.
One seated on her couch in lamentation, with the swords over her. She is as one who knows no sorrow which is like unto hers. It is a card of utter desolation.
Upright Meaning:
Death, failure, miscarriage, delay, deception, disappointment, despair, nightmares, worry, tension, extreme anxiety, obsession.
The face suggests that of a dark, intelligent woman, who has the quality of greatness. She contemplates her pentacle, using it as a tool of skrying and divination.
Upright Meaning:
Opulence, generosity, magnificence, liberty, meditation, divination, intelligence, dignity, potence, grand, important, majestic.
He sits in judgement, holding the unsheathed sword. He recalls the conventional symbol of justice in the Major Arcana, and he may represent this virtue, but he is rather the power of life and death.
Reversed Meaning:
Cruelty, perversity, barbarity, perfidy, bad intentions, a sharp tongue, insulting, insecurity, arrogance.
From the four great staves planted in the foreground there is a great garland suspended; two female figures uplift nosegays; at their side is a bridge over a moat, leading to an old manorial house.
Reversed Meaning:
Prosperity, increase, felicity, beauty, embellishment.
The devil holds the lovers, Adam and Eve in chains. This card represents the fall of man.
Upright Meaning:
Vengeance, violence, disgrace, force, lust, lies, cheating, hoax, bait, snake oil, disorder, confusion, false values, compulsion.