Secret of the High Priestess Spread

Difficulty: Average
This spread makes a nice alternative to the Celtic Cross, which covers basically the same ground. It is useful when a question doesn't quite call for the Ankh spread. This tarot spread is helpful for looking into a current trend. The High Priestess may or may not present a mysterious secret to be analysed after the rest of the spread.
1. & 2. Main impulses representing the topic at hand. They may compliment or oppose one another.
3. This is the current influence at this time.
5. The Waning Moon is the influence that is moving into the past.
4. The Waxing Moon indicates what is on the horizon, or the approaching influence. This is the immediate future.
7. The Light is what is clearly recognized, consciously.
6. The Dark indicates what is there but not fully perceived, though noticed on a deeper level of consciousness.
8. The Next Step is the near future, where this journey leads.
9. The final tarot card, only if it happens to be of the Major Arcana, reveals the Secret of the High Priestess. This is a special message that should be given added weight.
Your Secret of the High Priestess Reading
The Waxing Moon![]() XXI – The World |
The Full Moon![]() V – The Hierophant |
The Waning Moon![]() II – The High Priestess |
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Significator #1![]() 0 – The Fool |
Significator #2![]() XIII – Death |
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The Dark![]() VIII – Justice |
The Secret of the High Priestess![]() XVIII – The Moon |
The Light![]() XII – The Hanged Man |
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The Next Step![]() XV – The Devil |
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Significator #1
0 – The Fool
The Fool indicates you naturally expressing your place along the way of your journey. You have recently completed a powerful cycle, and are enthusiastically on your way in new endeavours. You may have freed yourself from enforced ignorance or blinding preconceptions.
Feel you're the natural new directions you are creating!
Significator #2
XIII – Death
Death indicates transformation. It is indicated to sacrifice unnecessary preconceptions you hold. The old you is evolving. A Phoenix is rising as a birth's introduction. Visualize a winter garden where things are resting for renewal. Patience is in fact a virtue of the Death card. Your perennial ideas and actions may naturalize to come back in different places more vibrantly.
If you are distressed at this time, mind your timing and placement. Do not trample on the new things in your life that appear small. Renewal and awakening may begin subtly. More is present than meets the eye.
Haste is not indicated. Slow your pace to be patiently present.
The Waning Moon is the influence that you are putting behind you, as it moves into the past.
II – The High Priestess
The High Priestess indicates inner illumination, you giving form to the formless, developing your creative conceptions with hidden influences actively at work. You may feel an unrevealed future as you put things together intuitively. Look into the night sky. The moon may resonate more with you at this time. Feel through tricksters like knowing the moon does not have its own light, but reflects in its own, powerful way.
Now is a powerful time to forge ahead with your projects, things you are working on.
The Full Moon is the current influence at this time.
V – The Hierophant
The Hierophant indicates infusing you, your mind-body-beautiful, with the divine, bringing your dreams clearly down to earth. Your spirit is radiating. Bring your dreams to reality from within you!
This time is well-suited for enhancing meaningful things in your life.
* A manner of reading a reversal is to emphasise rather than a reversed meaning, an internal meaning relating more to one's inner self than indicating the outer world. Read the card with your inner context, what it says to you about your inner person.
The Waxing Moon indicates what is on the horizon; the approaching influence.
XXI – The World
The World indicates that you are right back where you started and the journey is complete. A complete cycle is indicated. Look to new dreams, bigger ones. See the world IN The World card! View up through the looking glass of the obelisk from its base as if you are inside the obelisk looking up. See the point of its top right in front of you. Visualise the vanishing point of the top as a portal to infinity. Step smoothly through the doorway of your next iteration remembering this one.
The World indicates a powerful completion! Indicates a powerful completion cycle in The Fool's journey, YOUR journey!
Enjoy this time as you seamlessly segue into the next.
The Light is what is clearly recognized.
XII – The Hanged Man
The Hanged Man indicates you may be afloat in clarity with your spirituality and dreams and psychic abilities being wholly present. Ever peaceful, never suffering. Suspension, not life or death, is indicated.
The Hanged Man indicates to stop resisting and make yourself vulnerable to the positive things, and in doing so glimpse illumination. An insight so deep is indicated that, even if but for a moment, nothing but that insight will feel to exist. And, as timeless as that moment seems, there is also an acute awareness of its temporary nature. Remember this time as you may never see things quite the same.
Note your insights at this time, however great or small they are. You may feel forever changed by them, and by the memory of their presence.
The Dark shows what is there but not fully perceived, though it has been noticed on a deeper level of consciousness.
VIII – Justice
Justice indicates that your life is coming back into balance with a strong sense of fairness. This fairness indicates not to concentrate so much on right and wrong. Odds are you are a good person. Consequences and outcomes are more important at this time. Suggested to work to be considerate rather than being agreeable at this time. Consideration is a fitting use of the energies of Justice. Be mindful of yourself as you are, and mindful of others as they are. Your life decisions and the fabric of your unfolding patterns is indicated to be informed by your inner scale of weights and measures.
The Next Step is the near future, where this journey will take you.
XV – The Devil
The Devil indicates earthly desires rising in you. Mind that such feelings are nothing to fear, be ashamed of, or avoid so long as you are compassionate with yourself. Inhibitions can enslave as easily as excesses.
It is indicated that your expectations can be blind spots OR magical and invisible connections between things. It is also indicated to be mindful of your intensities. Your tethers are loose at this time. Don't let your intensities take you by surprise as you use the greater mobility.
Earthly desires can light you up and inspire you and make you feel great! Unrequited anything may be hurtful. Abolish your toxins of fear and you may very well feel the purity of your desires. Ambitions you have may be frightening and dangerous, but feel how they can be less frightening and dangerous than the subtle decay present if your hands are idle.
This is a strong time to start learning how it feels to be honest and alive inside and out!
&ask; A manner of reading a reversal is to emphasise rather than a reversed meaning, an internal meaning relating more to one's inner self than indicating the outer world. Read the card with your inner context, what it says to you about your inner person.
The Secret of the High Priestess - if, and only if, this card a Major Arcana, it reveals the Secret of the High Priestess. This is a special spiritual message that you should pay extra special attention to. If it is not a trump, the Priestess has revealed no secret.
XVIII – The Moon
The Moon indicates inner connections so intense that they transcend space. Your intense intuition can seamlessly join a variety of unseen forces in harmony as they are reflected inside you. Creative connections with seemingly impossible things can also be indicated.
The moon's reflection on a watery path can be disorienting OR a fascinatingly beautiful and mesmerising image to behold. The Moon indicates to feel your actions. Planning is for another time. Your planning may have placed you right where you are now. Move with only your natural movements in mind. There can be a kind of magnetism in this reflection.
Believing and knowing are not enough at this time. It is indicated to trust your intuition.
