When we talk about the "layout" or "card spread" in Tarot, it literally means how the cards are placed on the table during a reading. The photo above shows a three card layout.
Anything beyond that becomes arbitrary, symbolic and part of the internal intuitive process of doing a reading. In this three card example, the cards could mean past, present and future. It could be read left to right or right to left. It could be a yes-or-no layout (a "no" in this case) Owl and Bones on Instagram once where three cards like this read as "embrace, face, erase" which is one of the most useful, concise, wise layouts I've seen.
With layouts, the most important thing is the position meanings.
For the layout and reading to be helpful, it is important to have a clear, set idea about what each card symbolizes. If we think of the cards in the picture as a past-present-future reading, you want to determine before you even shuffle the cards which card will mean which thing. Are you reading right to left or left to right? Is the high priestess being read as past or future?
You can write a layout to have as many cards with whatever card position meanings that you like. It is all perfectly fine, as long as you decide all of that before you begin doing a reading. That decision is a key thing that helps the right message to come through.
Here are the layouts that I've written that I use for my private Tarot readings:
Seasons (previously “The Year Ahead”)
five cards
layout intended to give advice about how to best navigate the energy environment for the upcoming year
four cards for each upcoming season, read right to left in calendar order beginning from the current season when the reading is ordered
One card above the others to summarize the year as a whole
TaoCraft Path
Five cards
intended for understanding the current situation and navigating the near-future path at hand
read right to left: the past's influence, the current energies, the best way to move forward, the 'greater path' (the direction things are headed, the most accessible path forward) and the lesser path (a path forward that is open to choose, but potentially holds more challenges)
Yes / No
Three cards
elaborate shuffling and dealing method to reach the final three cards
uses all three showing cards to determine a simple yes or no answer
each of the three cards is then used to give an intuitive message relative to the question that was asked
Sage Sip
One card
general guidance, daily meditation, or focused follow-up to a larger reading
Ancient and ubiquitous, no one knows the origins of the one card layout.
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image credits: public domain (top) other images by the author.