Masa
Okay, guys! This is a bit of a doozy. I tried to be thorough, but don't worry--it's easier than the length of this post implies. Also, it's a lot of fun.
Ever since I started learning the tarot meanings, I've wanted to use them as building blocks for fictional stories. I've played with a lot of other people's spreads, and I've gone through a few of my own; this is my favorite so far. It produces diverse and exciting stories, and it helps you practice your reading in a huge variety of ways. The key is: it requires two decks!
FIRST DECK: Big and evocative
SECOND DECK: Small, if possible
If you have plenty of floor space and would prefer more direct inspiration, you could toss out the recommendation for smallness and use something exciting and action-packed for the second. I like using busy, meditative decks for the first one, but using theme decks could help situate the story in a specific genre--or even a fandom, if you want to do some randomized fanfic.
PART ONE -- SETTING THE SCENE
The first spread tells you where the story is beginning, who your main character is, what they care about, and who the other players in their life are. Using the first deck, lay out a Celtic Cross spread. I use reversals here to make it nice and complicated. When you get to the tenth (outcome) card, keep drawing until you get a Major. (Ignore the others.)
Look at the spread. Give your character a name. This will probably work with whatever version of the Celtic Cross you use--or with another medium-sized "situational snapshot" spread, if you want to try it that way--but the version of the CC presented at this website is extremely good for it. I'll give my breakdown of how to apply it here in the first comment.
Like all readings, this is all going to be highly contextual. Any card might mean something wildly different depending on the others around it. This is an awesome way for us novices to practice our pattern-finding skills (looking at suits, numbers, position-pairs, etc.), since there is literally no wrong answer.
If a court appears as card 1 (center of cross) or 7 (bottom of staff), that represents an aspect of the protagonist's identity; otherwise, treat it as another character. Follow your instincts about their relationship to the protagonist. (Is she his nemesis? Mother? Lover? Sister? Coworker? Rival? Female doppelganger?)
Since this whole spread is all about the ongoing development of the situation, the "outcome" card is replaced by a single trump that represents the overall theme. Pick one of the keywords associated with this card, and that can be your working title. If it's reversed, problematize it by adding "coping with" or "reaching for" or "fighting" or "...is for suckers" or something similar. For example, if the trump is the Magician, you could call the story "Willpower," or "Getting Started," or "The Man With the Tools, Baby," or what have you. If you got the Sun reversed, you could go with "Forcing a Smile," or "Losing Enthusing," or "I Am So Bored." This will help give you some direction with crafting your story later.
Stare at the CC for a while until you feel comfortable with it. Take notes if you need to. Then bust out your second deck!
PART TWO -- TELLING THE STORY
Now the fun starts. I like to use my Tiny Tarot for this, so that I don't end up scootching backwards over and over as the spread unfurls across my living room, but use whatever looks like the most fun to you.
Remove the major card that matches the theme from the previous deck, and set it aside. Leave everything else in and shuffle it all up. I advise against using reversals here, because while they make sense for expressing the tension within a single moment, they're all about /not/ evolving, and blockage, so they're not very useful for describing the way one moment changes to the next.
Here's how it works: the story is organized by Key Events, each of which is made up of three cards. The three cards are not read in sequence, but rather combined in whatever way makes them make the most sense. If you know ahead of time what kind of story you want to tell, you can customize the Key Events to your heart's content, including as many or as few as you wish. The name of the Key Event is basically like the position in a normal reading; it gives you a possible range of meanings, and perhaps a positive/negative flavor, but after laying out the cards, you do the rest!
Here is a possible series of key events:
01. The Adventure Begins!
02. The First Obstacle
03. Overcoming the First Obstacle
04. The Second Obstacle
05. Overcoming the Second Obstacle
06. The Third Obstacle
07. The Hero's Darkest Hour
08. The Hero's Rebirth
09. The Final Battle
10. Resolution
11. Conclusion
I change it up pretty much every time I do it, so feel free! Sometimes I don't even use pre-planned Key Events, but generally the guidance is nice. If you want to bust out the Monomyth, go for it! If you want to retell the Fool's Journey, do that! Do a travelogue, do a murder mystery, make a musical set to your favorite CD, help Aang master the four elements. You can separate out the court cards and designate certain slots to indicate new characters, or pre-establish cue cards ("when I get an ace, that's a chapter break"), or preeeeeetty much do whatever you want.
After you're all done, place the Theme card you set aside at the bottom of the spread and say "The End." Then give yourself a round of applause!
So, how to read the events? Here we come to the reason this spread uses two decks: Some of the cards you get in Part Two are likely to be the same as the ones you got in Part One. These are the elements that were established (even foreshadowed) at the beginning, so pay more attention to them! Be more extravagant in your interpretation of those events, and use them to pull in other stuff from the opening situation.
I can't really give specific advice about how to do this well--everything you've ever heard about tarot before applies, and everything you learn by practicing here will apply elsewhere. Use the numbers. Use the pictures. Use the esoterica. Be mysterious. Be extremely literal. Most of all, follow your storytelling instincts!
Write it down, record yourself telling the story, use it for your next NaNoWriMo plot, or just scramble everything up and do it again.
And let me know how it went.
Ever since I started learning the tarot meanings, I've wanted to use them as building blocks for fictional stories. I've played with a lot of other people's spreads, and I've gone through a few of my own; this is my favorite so far. It produces diverse and exciting stories, and it helps you practice your reading in a huge variety of ways. The key is: it requires two decks!
FIRST DECK: Big and evocative
SECOND DECK: Small, if possible
If you have plenty of floor space and would prefer more direct inspiration, you could toss out the recommendation for smallness and use something exciting and action-packed for the second. I like using busy, meditative decks for the first one, but using theme decks could help situate the story in a specific genre--or even a fandom, if you want to do some randomized fanfic.
PART ONE -- SETTING THE SCENE
The first spread tells you where the story is beginning, who your main character is, what they care about, and who the other players in their life are. Using the first deck, lay out a Celtic Cross spread. I use reversals here to make it nice and complicated. When you get to the tenth (outcome) card, keep drawing until you get a Major. (Ignore the others.)
Look at the spread. Give your character a name. This will probably work with whatever version of the Celtic Cross you use--or with another medium-sized "situational snapshot" spread, if you want to try it that way--but the version of the CC presented at this website is extremely good for it. I'll give my breakdown of how to apply it here in the first comment.
Like all readings, this is all going to be highly contextual. Any card might mean something wildly different depending on the others around it. This is an awesome way for us novices to practice our pattern-finding skills (looking at suits, numbers, position-pairs, etc.), since there is literally no wrong answer.
If a court appears as card 1 (center of cross) or 7 (bottom of staff), that represents an aspect of the protagonist's identity; otherwise, treat it as another character. Follow your instincts about their relationship to the protagonist. (Is she his nemesis? Mother? Lover? Sister? Coworker? Rival? Female doppelganger?)
Since this whole spread is all about the ongoing development of the situation, the "outcome" card is replaced by a single trump that represents the overall theme. Pick one of the keywords associated with this card, and that can be your working title. If it's reversed, problematize it by adding "coping with" or "reaching for" or "fighting" or "...is for suckers" or something similar. For example, if the trump is the Magician, you could call the story "Willpower," or "Getting Started," or "The Man With the Tools, Baby," or what have you. If you got the Sun reversed, you could go with "Forcing a Smile," or "Losing Enthusing," or "I Am So Bored." This will help give you some direction with crafting your story later.
Stare at the CC for a while until you feel comfortable with it. Take notes if you need to. Then bust out your second deck!
PART TWO -- TELLING THE STORY
Now the fun starts. I like to use my Tiny Tarot for this, so that I don't end up scootching backwards over and over as the spread unfurls across my living room, but use whatever looks like the most fun to you.
Remove the major card that matches the theme from the previous deck, and set it aside. Leave everything else in and shuffle it all up. I advise against using reversals here, because while they make sense for expressing the tension within a single moment, they're all about /not/ evolving, and blockage, so they're not very useful for describing the way one moment changes to the next.
Here's how it works: the story is organized by Key Events, each of which is made up of three cards. The three cards are not read in sequence, but rather combined in whatever way makes them make the most sense. If you know ahead of time what kind of story you want to tell, you can customize the Key Events to your heart's content, including as many or as few as you wish. The name of the Key Event is basically like the position in a normal reading; it gives you a possible range of meanings, and perhaps a positive/negative flavor, but after laying out the cards, you do the rest!
Here is a possible series of key events:
01. The Adventure Begins!
02. The First Obstacle
03. Overcoming the First Obstacle
04. The Second Obstacle
05. Overcoming the Second Obstacle
06. The Third Obstacle
07. The Hero's Darkest Hour
08. The Hero's Rebirth
09. The Final Battle
10. Resolution
11. Conclusion
I change it up pretty much every time I do it, so feel free! Sometimes I don't even use pre-planned Key Events, but generally the guidance is nice. If you want to bust out the Monomyth, go for it! If you want to retell the Fool's Journey, do that! Do a travelogue, do a murder mystery, make a musical set to your favorite CD, help Aang master the four elements. You can separate out the court cards and designate certain slots to indicate new characters, or pre-establish cue cards ("when I get an ace, that's a chapter break"), or preeeeeetty much do whatever you want.
After you're all done, place the Theme card you set aside at the bottom of the spread and say "The End." Then give yourself a round of applause!
So, how to read the events? Here we come to the reason this spread uses two decks: Some of the cards you get in Part Two are likely to be the same as the ones you got in Part One. These are the elements that were established (even foreshadowed) at the beginning, so pay more attention to them! Be more extravagant in your interpretation of those events, and use them to pull in other stuff from the opening situation.
I can't really give specific advice about how to do this well--everything you've ever heard about tarot before applies, and everything you learn by practicing here will apply elsewhere. Use the numbers. Use the pictures. Use the esoterica. Be mysterious. Be extremely literal. Most of all, follow your storytelling instincts!
Write it down, record yourself telling the story, use it for your next NaNoWriMo plot, or just scramble everything up and do it again.
And let me know how it went.