The Celestial Mirror Hopes & Fears Spread

Barleywine

The idea of merging hopes and fears in one position of the Celtic Cross has never set well with me, since I first learned Eden Gray's method of separating them out. But since it seems to be more common to lump them together, I thought I would ease my malaise by creating a whole spread to look at nothing but "hopes and fears" (or more properly, "hopes vs. fears"). It has echoes of the Tree of Life spread, but I mix things up a bit. It's basically a dual-train spread with a "best-case" side and a "worst-case" side, each read separately and then compared to see whether "hopes" or "fears" have more likelihood of dominating the outcome of a situation. It has many subtleties and will take some thought to get the most out of it.

I'm thinking it might be used as an offshoot of the CC "hopes and fears" deliberation when the situation is serious enough to warrant this much work. It could certainly be used independently as well.


ETA: Before anyone asks, I have no problem separating the astrological trump cards from the deck before laying out the spread, since the energies (planets/signs) are already "out there" and all this spread does is match the situation to that reality. The energies are already "at work" in the matter.
 

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Barleywine

Just a thought on the Hanged Man's position on the "Hopes" side of the equation, since it may come up. In placing the modern planets in the layout, I stayed with the usual alignment: Fool = Uranus; HM = Neptune; Judgement = Pluto, and set them above as echoing the "Supernals." My idea is that Judgement "stirs the pot," so it is better placed above "Chaos," while the Hanged Man deliberately tries "not to stir the pot," making it a better fit for "Order." Also I wanted all of the inspirational planets on the "Hopes" side: Neptune, Jupiter and Venus; Pluto, Mars and Mercury go well together on the "Fears" side, while Uranus, Sun and Moon have more to do with the "internal" realms of "Spirit" and "Heart." The World (Saturn) "bookends" the Fool (Uranus) in the middle column.
 

rylla

Another interesting spread, I just have some questions:

- Which type of questions would you use it (i.e. Hopes and Fears for the outcome of a situation?)

- when you say "Lay out the astrological pattern first." - do you lay out the actual Magus, Devil, etc or the cards from the deck as they come (you talked about separating the deck so I suspect you choose the actual Magus, Devil, etc)

- how you'd formulate the meaning of position 1? And the meaning of the Hope position and Fear position would be about your hopes or hopes for the positive outcome of a situation?

Thanks!
 

Barleywine

rylla said:
Another interesting spread, I just have some questions:

- Which type of questions would you use it (i.e. Hopes and Fears for the outcome of a situation?)

- when you say "Lay out the astrological pattern first." - do you lay out the actual Magus, Devil, etc or the cards from the deck as they come (you talked about separating the deck so I suspect you choose the actual Magus, Devil, etc)

- how you'd formulate the meaning of position 1? And the meaning of the Hope position and Fear position would be about your hopes or hopes for the positive outcome of a situation?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

I would treat the question the same way we presently do the "Hopes and Fears" position in the Celtic Cross spread - as related to whatever situation you're facing at the time, and asking whether its more reasonable to be hopeful or fearful over whatever outcome you're concerned about. There is no specific position called "the Question." It's the relative strength or weakness of the two "halves" of the spread that show the ascendancy of one over the other.

Yes, you take the named cards out of the deck and place them in the assigned positions as a kind of "overlay." This might seem to be restricting the scope of the actual reading draw, but my thought is that these cards are already at their "stations" and can be interpreted as inputs to the actual spread. The orange-colored positions constitute the spread proper.

The Spirit card and the Heart card (Positions #1 and #6) represent the higher and lower aspects of the querent's aspirations in the matter: one above the Sun and more elevated, the other below the Sun and more visceral. I would then read cards #2, 4 and 7 and cards #3, 5 and 8 as two sets with the central cards - #4, Fears and #5, Hopes - as the main focus. The shadow cards and the astrological factors provide "shading." For example, Fear as a product of the Mars/Tower and the Mercury/Magus interface, or Doubt as a blending of Mercury/Magus and Saturn/Devil.
 

rylla

Barleywine said:
I would treat the question the same way we presently do the "Hopes and Fears" position in the Celtic Cross spread - as related to whatever situation you're facing at the time, and asking whether its more reasonable to be hopeful or fearful over whatever outcome you're concerned about. There is no specific position called "the Question." It's the relative strength or weakness of the two "halves" of the spread that show the ascendancy of one over the other.

Yes, you take the named cards out of the deck and place them in the assigned positions as a kind of "overlay." This might seem to be restricting the scope of the actual reading draw, but my thought is that these cards are already at their "stations" and can be interpreted as inputs to the actual spread. The orange-colored positions constitute the spread proper.

The Spirit card and the Heart card (Positions #1 and #6) represent the higher and lower aspects of the querent's aspirations in the matter: one above the Sun and more elevated, the other below the Sun and more visceral. I would then read cards #2, 4 and 7 and cards #3, 5 and 8 as two sets with the central cards - #4, Fears and #5, Hopes - as the main focus. The shadow cards and the astrological factors provide "shading." For example, Fear as a product of the Mars/Tower and the Mercury/Magus interface, or Doubt as a blending of Mercury/Magus and Saturn/Devil.
Click to expand...

Thank you very much! It cleared all my questions. Hopefully it will be helpful to other people too.
 
Tarot Reading using cyrstals The Cynic's Guide to the End of the World