spread: box of 9

i figured out a me-compatible way to read the classic box of 9 spread! usually when i see the whole thing laid out, my brain can only parse it as three rows of three. especially using a pip deck, they just "snap together". i can't read columns and diagonals, the images don't work like that for me. but it seems a shame to lay out a whole grid and only get rows out of it. there's also the cartomantic tradition of reading the corners and the diamond shape to mean things, but again - that's all gone once it's all laid out. so instead i started laying it out in a way that prevents it being a spread of full rows of 3 for as long as possible!

also, to squeeze out some more info (to compensate for the lack of column and diagonal reading), i'm recently trying calculating extra quintessential cards, in the way of Marilyn from Tarot Clarity. she generates a quint for each row, and at the end uses those row-quints to calculate a quint for the entire reading.

a quintessence is something like a summary or theme card. it's a traditional technique in many french spreads, primarily i think in the french cross, where you add the arms of the cross to arrive at the quint you place in the middle. i use the first drawn card to be the theme/core of the reading, so the quint becomes more of a mood that colors the row it refers to. it sets a tone that can be used also as an indicator of how the described situation might develop. to generate a quint card you add the values of the cards in that row, then keep subtracting 22 until you arrive at a valid major arcana number. the only tricky bit is deciding what values you want to use for your court cards.

• you could skip them altogether but what if a row is comprised completely of courts? does it automatically get the fool as its quint?
• you can treat the courts as extensions of the pips - page being 11, knight being 12 etc.
• you can rank the courts in some other way. maybe 1 through 4 but would it be starting with the page or the king?
• if you're so inclined, you can use the golden dawn values used in the opening of the key card counting operations, 7 for the page/princess, 4 for everything else (not for me, i'm trying not to read the marseille using the later esoteric layers).

so here's my actual reading process for the 9 box:

• 1. the central card comes first - what's the heart of the matter?
• 2. the four corners, laid out one by one to be read individually first. these are the "corner-stones" - the main influences, factors, players. you can try and relate them to one another as well.
• 3. the remaining four cards that form the inner diamond, again laid out and interpreted one at a time. these are the less obvious or hidden influences, patterns, connections.
• 4. now read each row and calculate its quint. if possible, also try to tie in neighboring cards from other rows to color each triad/individual card, but that's the hard part for me.
• 5. finally summarize with the quint-of-quints.

and there you have it! maybe it will help someone be more flexible and creative with how you can approach the same spread in different ways.

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