The “Personality Plus” Character Analysis Spread

Here is a spread that builds on the standard four-factor identity model by allowing for an “unfolding” or “flowering” of the basic personality snapshot into multi-faceted fullness stimulated by elemental interaction between the cards pulled and the underlying “state of being” reflected in each “phase:” Fire and Wands represent the Will (including primary drives, urges and desires of all kinds); Water and Cups describe the emotional life; Air and Swords show the domain of the intellect; and Earth and Pentacles embody the world of physical sensation. For example, an individual who is “super-charged” with four Fire cards might be insufferable, and the only saving grace could be a counter-balancing “quint” card like the High Priestess or the Hierophant.

If there is no reinforcing affinity or undermining disunity between any of the four “Basic Personality” cards and their elemental phases, the individual will have to “play the hand they’re dealt” without favorable or unfavorable bias, thus finding their path entirely through experience and not merely the “luck of the draw.” Any emerging character complex shown by one or more “adder” cards following the basic card is summarized by the calculation of a Major Arcana “quintessence” card to express the “full flowering” of that mode of personality (as the saying goes, “for good or ill”). This might be thought of as the Higher Mind (Superconscious), or “man behind the curtain” in Wizard of Oz terms, that can better explain why individuals “are the way they are.”

Originally published at http://parsifalswheeldivination.wordpress.com on February 24, 2022.