Collaborative Spread Creation #2 - Infidelity

le fey

This isn't to push for what isn't relevent to the the collaboration, but I thought I would share some of the reasoning behind my suggestion of looking at the definitions of infidelity each side holds (including the querent).

Maybe I've never defined 'infidelity' for myself - I know I want a faithful partner, but I don't really know what that means.... until I'm going through a jealous fit of trauma over finding out he volunteers to start a project that work that has him spending long hours at night with a pretty coworker...and it doesn't even matter to me if they are having sex - if he was faithful he'd never put himself in that situation!!

And meanwhile, he - like more than one man I know (including at least one President) doesn't think it's infidelity unless actual genital to genital intercourse takes place. And therefore can and will quite sincerely assure you he's faithful when he's doing things that most of the world would regard as total infidelity. (You want to know about this guy...because he not only 'cheats' but he sincerely doesn't believe he is and that makes those assurances particularly crazy-making lies)

By seeing them side by side, there is a lot of revelations that can happen (such as 'wow, we better actually work out the 'rules' of fidelity here, because our assumptions are at great odds') when you see your own view staring up at you... and theirs clearly being very different.

So...what's his tendency to cheat. Do you mean tendency to not consider that you expect him never to be alone with someone of the opposite sex that is sexually interesting? Maybe your answer is yes, he might just do that - does it make him a big cheater, then? (not by my definition..or his. But you can call him that and make him into a villian, or you can decide he's worth sitting down with and hammering out some spoken agreements instead of assumptions that cause hurt and misunderstanding).

If looking at your definition and thinking 'hmm, that's a little nutty' helps you stop being suspicious.. that's a pretty good result.
 

rwcarter

The weekend's almost over (I'm about 30 min away from starting to get ready for bed) and I didn't have a chance to get back to this.

The various iterations of spreads that we've come up with have all focused on cheating/infidelity, not on casual encounters and whether or not the two people in the relationship have similar or different ideas about what constitutes cheating. As I believe I've said somewhere on the forum, sometimes you end up creating a lot of different spreads and discarding them before you come up with the right spread for the situation. That can sometimes just be part of the process that we're trying to demonstrate to folks who want to create their own spreads. So I have no problem with scratching everything we've come up with so far and starting over with a focus on casual encounters and each person's view of those.

On the one hand I really don't want to include a position for the Querent's view on fidelity because I think that's information the Querent should already know. On the other hand though, if we don't have such a position, how will we be able to compare the card for the partner to the card for the Querent?

Before giving it even a few minute's thought, I was concerned about how a reader could interpret various cards as relating to one's view of fidelity. But running through a few cards quickly in my head, I can see how that could be done.

So with this new focus, I think Cat*'s layout is probably the best, although I'm not really fond of Xa, Xb, Xc positions in most spreads. We could easily do something like:

.....5.....
1...4....2
.....3.....

where

1. Querent's view of fidelity in a relationship
2. Partner's view of fidelity in a relationship
3. Partner's past history of fidelity (should the focus be on all of the partner's past relationships or just on this one?)
4. Partner's current record of fidelity in this relationship
5. What Querent needs to know about partner's potential future fidelity in this relationship

I don't think we need a specific position to examine the difference in perspective between the two people. If we get the 2C or 10C for the Querent and the Devil for the partner, I think it'll be quite apparent how different their perspectives are. And if we get say the 2C for the Querent and the 2P for the partner, we'd know they were on the same page (balance) but in different books (one about love and one about money).

It'll be time for me to get up before I know it, so I need to get ready for bed....

Rodney
 

BeyondtheVeil

The questions for the spreads that I used.

Rodney wanted me to post if I figured out something to use. I decided to use two different spreads. I felt it was just too confusing to mix them all up. I decided to figure out first if there was any cheating that had or was going on.

The first reading I used Cat's idea of the past/present/future questions.

1}. What has happened in terms of cheating in the past?

2}.What is happening in terms of cheating in the present?

3}.What will likely happen in terms of cheating in the future if the relationship continues the way it is now?

{This was based on the current relationship. but I think if one wants to know about all previous relationships it could also apply}. It would clearly state if there is a pattern of cheating.

This helped because it clearly stated if there had been any cheating in the past, if there were currently any going on, etc. It was very clear from just these three questions if we needed to go any further with the reading. If it showed there was no cheating in the past/present of the relationship.. then there probably wasn't a high chance of it in the future. In this case.. there was a strong possiblity as there had been some 'issues' in the past.


I kept Cat's original positions with it.

3- What will likely happen in terms of cheating in the future if the relationship continues the way it is now?


2- What is happening in terms of cheating in the present?


1- What has happened in terms of cheating in the past?

3
2
1



I did the second spread to clarify the 'cheating".

The second spread I decided to combine a lot of people's ideas on this thread. This spread went like this..

I took le fey's questions...
What is A's definition of infidelity?
What is B's definition of infidelity?

as the first two questions starting the new spread.

Then I took afrosaxon's question...
Why I think my partner is cheating on me



Then this question-
What the Querent needs to know about the partner's fidelity or lack thereof


The next two questions I took from SilentBreeze..
What is actually happening?
How will the situation change/not change in the next 3 months?



So this is how it looked:
1}. What is A's definition of infidelity?
2}. What is B's definition of infidelity?
3}.Why {Fill-in-the-blank} thinks their partner is cheating on them?
4}.What the Querent needs to know about the partner's fidelity or lack thereof.
5}.What is actually happening?
6}. How will the situation change/not change in the next 3 months?


le fey's questions were definitely helpful and it did state the differences even some subtle.

What is actually happening was also very helpful as it stated what was actually happening not just insecurities, etc.

Question 4 was okay although question 3 had already answered that quite nicely and to the point. {They had been unable to resist temptations}.


So all in all, I think that they worked nicely. I think that the second spread could easily be done without question #4. It was already asked/answered with question 3, so it was kinda of a wasted space.


I don't do anything fancy with spreads as I get what I need laying them out
1
2
3
4
5
6

If someone needs to do something different.. I would do what one 'feels' that is best for them.
If you take out question 4, then it would be a 5 card spread. :)


Thanks everyone for your help and suggestions! Querent was very pleased with the results as was I! :)


BeyondtheVeil
 

Glass Owl

I posted the following spread awhile back in this thread.

I basically took a lot of people's ideas (Cat, SilentBreeze, le fey, rwcarter, afrosaxon, BeyondTheVeil, etc) from this Collaborative Spread Creation Thread and threw my own ideas into the mix. This is what I came up with. Modify to suit your own needs.


My Fidelity Clarification Spread (8) by Glass Owl

1--7--8
2------
3--4---
5------
6------


1. Current state of the relationship
2 Partner's view of fidelity in this relationship
3. Querent's view of fidelity in this relationship
4. Why the Querent suspects their partner has cheated on them in the past 3 months or that their partner will cheat on them in the next 3 months.*
5. What the Querent needs to know about the partner's fidelity or lack thereof
6. The most important thing the Querent needs to know about what's going on with the partner.
7. What does the querent need to know most about dealing with the situation**
8. How will the relationship change/not change in the next 3 months*

* You can change the time frame to something else if you prefer.

** "This could point to many different things, depending on the previous cards. It also depends on the querent's own limits. For example, some people are willing and able to let infidelity go if it's over already; others would still feel deeply betrayed and would want to leave/kick out their partner. Others again may get advice about improving the relationship to avoid cheating in the future here." -Cat
 

Luna's Crone

I myself wouldn't add anything to the first five. I would just pull a card to clarify a position if i thought it needed it. nothing says its not kosher if you need to pull extra cards for the information needed. That way, a person can read the spread their own way with or without the extra cards.

Sometimes as in this case, its been a bit over thought. imo