5 cards · intermediate

The Crossroads

Two options laid side by side, with what each costs and what each opens, plus the thing neither path resolves.

Draw the The Crossroads spread

Optional, and worth doing. Questions starting with what or how, about you, get far more out of a reading than yes/no or predictive ones.

Changes which part of each card's meaning is surfaced.

Reversals

New to tarot? Turn these off until the upright meanings feel automatic.

How to read the The Crossroads

For a genuine binary: take the job or stay, move or don't, end it or continue.

How to read it: read each branch as a pair: the cost card and the gain card together. A path with a heavy cost and a large gain is not automatically worse than a light one with a small gain.

The fifth card is the point of the spread. It names what will still be true whichever branch you take, which is usually the thing you were actually trying to solve by choosing.

Full guide and layout diagram

The positions

  1. Path A: What It CostsWhat you give up by taking the first option.
  2. Path A: What It OpensWhat becomes possible on this path.
  3. Path B: What It CostsWhat you give up by taking the second option.
  4. Path B: What It OpensWhat becomes possible on this path.
  5. What RemainsWhat is true either way. The thing the decision will not solve.

For reflection and entertainment. Not medical, legal, or financial advice.