Deck Interview + Tarot Spread: Spread Machine Cards + Oracle
I missed the Kickstarter for the Spread Machine Cards + Oracle deck by Kimberly M. Tsan of Fables Den, but I snagged it on Indiegogo. I was super excited to get the deck when I ordered it, but the timing wasn’t right to try it out when I received it. Now it’s calling to me.
The deck can be used as an oracle, but I bought it to use as a spread-crafting tool because I love creating tarot (and oracle) spreads, and it’s a fun idea. So instead of a normal deck interview, I used the cards in conjunction with my deck interview spread to create a brand new new spread, Tough Lessons. Despite the cute rainbow aesthetic, there’s a panda-powered punch (pandas are a major theme in Tsan’s work).
What major lesson in gratitude am I learning right now?
Which divine energy is the source for this healthy challenge?
How can my experience help others transcend their own perceived limits?
What could my resistance to this lesson attract if I remain blocked?
How can this lesson provide clarity in understanding my motivation?
What good works will I create once I assert my wiser self?
How will I know when it’s time to take a pause for self-care?
There’s a coherence to the spread here that might have been challenging to see without the guiding structure of my own previous spread, and it makes me excited to mix and match pre-existing spreads with these cards. You could definitely also just pull cards for a smaller spread or pull a bunch of cards and work through rearranging them to create a spread, but this remixing of existing spreads seems way more fun to me. That said, I wouldn’t suggest trying to use these cards to recreate a large spread with specific positions, such as the fifteen-card Golden Dawn spread, but you could definitely pull 3–7 at a time and then build any connecting points as needed to fill in the gaps.
For example, I could draw five cards to create a Golden Dawn-inspired spread with five trios of cards (like the original spread). Each trio would speak to one of the five areas designated by the Spread Machine cards.
I just randomly pulled cards: Attract, Forgive, Subconscious, Expression, and Transcend. So I would have a central trio about setting an intention to receive and attract: the central card could be the what; the surrounding cards could indicate how. The two “paths" of Forgive and Subconscious don’t really work as paths (as in the original) so much as work together to create fuller understanding. They suggest some broader potential for this remixed spread to help with shadow work or trauma healing. The Forgive trio might again be a what/how combination, whereas the Subconscious may be a three-card story about what’s underneath the surface of the need to forgive or the trauma/shadow itself. The two remaining cards of Expression and Transcend don’t make a lot of sense as sources of effect (the original would have an internal factor and an external factor), but instead feel like opportunities to work through or past the shadow work, almost like the two paths that didn’t work for Forgive and Subconscious. I’ll probably create an actual spread from that later, but I don’t know if I’ll post about it. I’ll have to see how it works out in a real reading.
Since the Spread Machine deck has different categories of cards, it might also be helpful to select a specific category that is relevant to the original card position if you plan to use them in remixing as I do.
For example, for the first card in the Celtic Cross, I might pull from only the Seeker cards. And for the second card, I might pull from only the Shadow cards. That can help provide coherence and some familiarity while re-imagining what the Celtic Cross could be.
In this case, I pulled a Seeker card (Relationship) and a Shadow card (Excuse), and it’s already going down a very different road! You can follow it on your own if you feel so inclined, but that’s a thought experiment for another day for me.
The cards pictured above come from the Spread Machine Cards + Oracle deck by Kimberly M. Tsan © Fables Den, 2021. All rights reserved. You can pre-order the deck soon (if not literally now) through the Fables Den website.
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