Tarot Spreads for Self-Growth, Introspection & Transformation

Tarot isn’t just for fortune-telling—it can be used for “self-telling.”

The symbols, imagery and metaphors used in tarot can be related to your life and used to gain insight into everyday problems or deeply-rooted patterns.

In this guide, you’ll learn how to use tarot for self-growth. We’re also sharing 6 tarot spreads for self-growth and introspection.

Psychology and Tarot for Self-Growth

Although tarot was originally intended to predict the future, it can also be used as a tool for self-growth and introspection. The symbols, themes and life stages contained within the cards can help you gain perspective on your own situation.

Tarot follows the Hero’s Journey–a narrative/template that many stories and movies follow. No matter the story, the Hero’s Journey follows a character through many stages of wins, losses, self-growth and challenges. The stages contained in the hero’s journey, and the tarot, represent the human experience. As we go through the cards in a tarot deck, we see how each card relates to a different human experience on that Hero’s Journey. Zooming in on these stages and taking various perspectives can help us learn more about our own experiences. This is a main reason tarot spreads for self-growth can help you gain insight. Learning about the archetypes in the tarot relates to your own life challenges and solutions.

Interestingly, therapists have started using tarot as a self-growth tool. It allows clients to consider the card’s meanings, drawing insights and relating it back to their own life.

A late founding father of psychology, Carl Jung, said similar Medieval cards ““combine in certain ways, and the different combinations correspond to the playful development of mankind.” He also thinks divination methods can help us understand the flow of life and help us access the unconscious.

How to Use Tarot for Self-Growth

If you’re interested in tarot spreads for self-growth, here’s a few tips:

• Keep a journal. Write down the cards pulled every time you use a self-love tarot spread. This can help you keep track of your development and how you’re moving forward. It can also help you assess which blocks you still need to overcome.
• Work with a therapist. As discussed, therapists are beginning to use tarot as a tool not for fortune-telling, but for self-introspection. By seeking a therapist who uses tarot, you can learn ways to use to for your personal growth.
• Keep your mind open. Interpretations from tarot can come from a handbook or by looking at a card’s images, colors, symbols, metaphors, etc.
• If you pull a card that you’re interested in drawing more meaning from, meditate on it. Keep the card nearby during a meditation. After a few minutes of deep breathing, recall the card’s imagery. Let thoughts about its meaning naturally come to you.
• When you’re curious to learn more about a card and how it relates to your life, study it like you would a school lesson. Turn to books, articles, everything you can to get a full grasp on the card.
• Use the card in an altar. During your tarot spreads for self-growth, pay attention to the cards that resonate with you most. Include those cards in an altar. That way, it will serve as a daily reminder to reflect on the cards and how they’re relating to your life.

Self-Growth Body Scan

This tarot spread for self-growth hits several areas in one reading. Starting off, you’ll get a reflection on your spiritual journey. Then you’ll learn how to improve your mental health and stress responses. Moving on, you’ll gain insights on creativity, grounding, giving and receiving. Ready to learn more about yourself? Pull out your cards and try the spread below.

1. How can you feel more connected spiritually? Throughout our spiritual journey, we have times when we feel more and less connected. Wherever you’re at now, how can you improve that connection to your higher self/the Universe/God?
2. How you can improve your mental health? The second card in this tarot spread for self-growth represents your mental health. What can you do to feel more at peace and maintain or achieve emotional stability or safety?
3. How you can alleviate stress? This card represents your stomach center, where stress and anxiety may lie. Whether you’re dealing with big stresses or small stressors, how can you better handle it?
4. How can you expand your creativity? This card will hint at how you can find more creativity. Keep in mind, creativity could mean many things. This card could show how to be more creative in your hobbies, in your thoughts or in problem-solving.
5. How can you get more grounded? The first foot in this stick figure-shaped layout represents grounding. What are some things you can do to get more grounded?
6. How can you feel more connected to others? The card shows ways you might better connect with the people around you. Whether it’s family, relationships or meeting new friends, a little connection can go a long way.
7. How can you better receive help and support? The second last card in this tarot spread for self-growth represents receiving. What are your blocks with receiving and how can you overcome it?
8. How can you better give help and support? The 7^th card is about receiving and this last card is about giving. How can you give back and help others to keep the energy flowing?

Leveling Up Tarot Spread for Self-Growth

This tarot spread for self-growth asks you to keep in mind where you want to go in life. Each of the cards will reveal a different aspect of moving forward. What’s holding you back? What steps should you take? How can you gain support? Learn the answers to all those questions and more using this layout.

1. Where am I? The first card in this tarot spread for self-growth represents where you’re at in life. What are the situations concerning you?
2. Where do I want to go? This card represents where you want to go. This could speak to a dream or goal or to a larger picture of who you want to become.
3. Internal influences holding me back. Which internal influences seem to be getting in the way of where you want to go? Internal factors include those originating in yourself. These are typically factors within your control.
4. External influences affect the situation. Which external influences seem to be getting in the way of where you want to go? External factors include those originating outside yourself. It could be other people, environmental, situations, etc. These tend to include factors you can’t control or have less influence over.
5. How to move forward onto where you want to go. The 5^th card in this tarot spread for self-growth represents how to move forward to where you want to go. What steps can you take?
6. What mindset do I need on this journey? Although the card above suggests steps you can take to move forward, this card speaks to the mindset you’ll need for the journey ahead.
7. What do I need to let go of for this journey? In order to move forward to where you want to go, what’s something you should consider shedding? This could be an aspect of yourself, a belief, relationships, practical matters, etc.
8. How to gain support on your journey. The last card speaks to how you can gain support as you move along. Support can mean people, professional, financial, written resources, community resources, etc.

Transformation Tarot Spread for Self-Growth

This all-encompassing self-growth tarot spread hits on all areas of your life. Begin by assessing the core of who you are. Then let the cards show you challenges and solutions for your love life, career, health and spirituality. End the reading by learning the first step you should take along with a message from spirit.

Core:

• 1. Who you were in the recent past. The first card in this transformation tarot spread for self-growth represents your past. Who were you then compared to now? How were you different?
• 2. Who you are right now. How have you grown from your old self already? How would the tarot describe you at this moment in time?
• 3. Who you want to become. This third card points to who you want to become. This is an overview of the person you want to be and the life you want to lead as a whole.
• 4. The biggest factor influencing your transformation. This card represents the biggest influence on your transformation as a whole. It could be your mindset, personal situations or external influences like the people around you or current opportunities.

Love:

• 5. The state of your current love life. This card represents how your love life is going at this moment in time. Are you taken and happy? Taken and unhappy? Single and happy? Single and unhappy?
• 6. The challenge you’re currently facing. What current are you currently trying to overcome in your love life?
• 7. How to transform that current challenge. How can you transform the love challenge you’re experiencing?

Career:

• 8. The state of your current career life. The first card on this wing points toward how your career life is currently operating.
• 9. The challenge you’re currently facing. What challenge are you dealing with career-wise?
• 10. How to transform that current challenge. How can you transform that challenge to better your career life?

Health:

• 11. The state of your current health. How’s your health right now? This card takes into account physical and emotional health.
• 12. The challenge you’re currently facing. Are you facing any health challenges right now? What are they? This could also point to factors influencing your health that you need to mitigate.
• 13. How to transform that current challenge. How can you overcome that challenge to better your health?

Spirituality:

• 14. Where you’re at on your spiritual journey. The last wing on the butterfly is about spirituality. This card specifically points out how your spiritual life is currently. Are you more connected or disconnected?
• 15. The challenge you’re currently facing. What’s a challenge you’ll need to overcome to progress in your spiritual life?
• 16. How to transform that current challenge. How can you overcome that challenge to lead a more fulfilling and meaningful spiritual life?

Final messages

• 17. The first step you can take towards overall transformation. From love, career, health and spirituality, there’s a lot of ways to transform your life. That can be overwhelming, so let’s break it down. What is the first step you can take?
• 18. Message from higher self-regarding transformation. To cap off this reading, gain insights about your transformation with a message from your higher self/spirit.

Home Inside Myself Self Love Tarot Spread

What would it take for you to feel home inside yourself? This tarot spread for self-love helps you identify your blocks. Get vulnerable about your insecurities and learn how you can move past them. If you can’t see the amazingness you have to offer the world, this layout will help. Get insights on future accomplishments and even a personal talent. At the end of the reading, you’ll learn who/what can support you for more self-love, along with a message from spirit.

1. Your current self. The first card in this tarot spread for self-love represents your current yourself.
2. How you feel about yourself. Whereas the first card describes who you are, the second card describes how you feel about yourself. Are you confident and self-compassionate? Self-loathing and critical? Or something in between?
3. An insecurity you have. This card points to something specific you’re insecure about, whether internal, external or situational.
4. External influences affecting you insecurities. What are the external influences affecting your insecurity? This may be habits, environments, people, or situations.
5. How you can move past that insecurity? How can you begin to overcome your insecurity and see the truth about who you are?
6. How can you practice more self-love? What’s something you can do to practice more self-love and self-compassion?
7. What’s something I need to let go of? What can you let go of that will allow you to cultivate more self-acceptance?
8. A personal talent. This card shows you a personal talent. It may be one you already know about (and that you should amplify) or a talent you’ve yet to uncover.
9. How can I use my personal talent? How can you use the personal talent revealed in the card prior?
10. Something you should be proud of. What’s something you should be proud of? This may be a past accomplishment or something about your character.
11. A future accomplishment. What’s something you’ll accomplish in the future that you can look forward to?
12. Who/what can I look to for support along my self-love journey? Self-love and compassion can be difficult. Who or what can you turn to as you walk along that journey?
13. A message from my higher self about self-love. What message does your higher self/spirit have for you about self-love and acceptance?

Tarot Spread for Self Help

This tarot spread for self-help mainly focuses on the patterns hindering your path forward. Both personal and generational patterns can pose as roadblocks. Instead of trying to rush past these roadblocks, how can you remove it from the road entirely? Removing these and learning to be more kind to yourself will lead you to the person you aspire to be.

1. The person I aspire to be. This card represents who you’re working toward being. This person may not be evident on the outside yet, but it’s somewhere inside you.
2. A personal pattern to break. What’s a personal pattern you have that’s destructive or acting as a block?
3. How to break that personal pattern. What step can you take to break that personal pattern and clear that block? Overcoming this will bring you closer to who you want to be.
4. A family/generational pattern to break. Most of us have family/generational patterns that we carry forth, even if we don’t mean to and even if we already know they’re destructive. What’s the family pattern that’s most holding you back?
5. How to break that family/generational pattern. How can you be a cycle breaker? Overcoming this block will allow you to move forward and closer to the person you want to be.
6. How can I be more kind to myself? Finally, no matter who you are, it’s hard to be you. That’s because it’s hard to be a human being sometimes. During times of difficulty, how can you be more kind to yourself? How can you cultivate more self-compassion?

Summary: Tarot Spreads for Self-Growth, Love and Introspection

Tarot is a great tool to use for self-growth and introspection. Since tarot follows the Hero’s Journey, each card can relate to a stage of life that’s common in the human experience. This allows great insights to come from tarot. Scroll through the tarot spreads for self-growth above and choose a layout that speaks to you most. Consider different ways to interpret the cards and layout. This allows you to expand your perspective, opening up to self-growth.