By With 2022 just around the corner and its energy already manifesting into reality as of the month of December, this is a great time to take a look at what the New Year has in store for you and/or your loved ones. The Wheel of the Year is the perfect tarot spread to do that.
When should you use the Wheel Of The Year tarot spread?
Though the name might sound daunting or complex, the Wheel of the Year is actually one of the easiest tarot spreads you can use to look into the energy of the current or the next year.
I don’t advise you to use it now for the year after the next though, meaning in 2021 for 2023, since the energy of that cycle is too tentative at this point. If you want to look into the potential energies of 2023, wait until 2022 starts, at the very least. The closer you get to the year in question, the stronger its energetic blueprint is and the more informative and to the point your spread will be.
It’s fine to use this spread for a current year too, even if a couple months of it have already passed. If the energies showing up in the spread haven’t manifested into your life by the time you’re using the spread, then you might run into them by the end of the current year too.
But if you’re more than six months into the current year and you want to use the Wheel Of The Year to look into what’s coming up next, it might be better to use a different spread specifically tailored for the next however many months instead, for clarity’s sake.
How to use the Wheel of the Year tarot spread
Ask spirit what the next year has in store for you and shuffle your deck. As you shuffle, you can decide if you’re looking for general information or if you’d like to do a specific spread for a topic like love, career, spiritual development, or whatever else. Focus on the topic and on your desire to find out what the year has in store for you and shuffle the deck until you feel like the cards are ready.
The layout of your Wheel of the Year spread
Our version of the Wheel of the Year spread includes 13 cards: a general or overall influence for the entire year, and then 12 cards, one for each month. Once you’re done shuffling your cards, cut the deck wherever you feel called to and pull the card from where you cut it. That’s your central or overall influence for the spread.
You can set it in the center of an imaginary circle and then place the rest of the cards in a circle around that, or you can simply put your overall influence on one row and then pull the next 12 cards and place them either after the central one or on a row beneath.
When it comes to this tarot spread and others, the most important aspect of it is to customize the layout and process to what feels right to you. How you place the cards isn’t necessarily as important as it is for the layout to feel right to you and make sense without you having to think about it.
Use notes, a cheat sheet or pieces of paper with hints written on them
When you first start using this spread, for instance, you can use notes, a drawing of the cards in the spread and what they talk about, or some small pieces of paper that you write the months on and the word “general”/“overall”/“main energy”, whatever is suggestive to you. That way, you won’t have to stop your intuitive flow in order to think about which card means what or what month the 4th card in the row pertains to.
After you’ve used the spread a few times and have found the natural placements for the cards so they make perfect sense to you without having to think about it, you can stop using those little pieces of paper or any notes.
Card meanings in your Wheel of the Year Tarot Spread
Your main or overall card talks about the overarching theme of the year. It’s going to influence each of the other cards and will be like the theme of your year. For the other 12 cards are pretty straightforward in the sense that you have one card for each month. By combining the meaning of the main or overall card with the meaning of the card for each month, you’ll get the idea of what that month is likely to have in store for you.
If you’re not entirely sure about the message about a month or more of them, you can also pull clarifying cards for each particular card of the month. Keep in mind that will make the spread substantially more complex though, and if you’re a beginner it might get overwhelming.
Take notes as you’re interpreting your cards or record yourself in audio or even video format as you interpret the messages. Those notes or recordings will come in handy as the year unfolds. You’ll be able to monitor how those energies played out and have an idea of what might be coming up next so you can achieve your goals.
Find out what’s in store for you in 2022!
Now that we’ve talked about the Wheel of the Year tarot spread and how you can use it, you can take a bold step and look into what the New Year has in store for you.
Pick up your favorite tarot deck and shuffle the cards to give this spread a try. Take the information you get as a sort of road map that’s going to help you better navigate the next year.
Author bio
Mary Aragon is the tarologist and astrologist behind AbcTarot. Her mission is to make tarot and astrology understandable for everyone as a tool for reflecting and understanding our lives.
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