Life Purpose Tarot Card Spread

Life purpose is something that many people want more insight into. We all wonder from time to time why we are here, what we are supposed to be doing and if we are in the right job, city or relationship. We all come to Earth with a mission, but forget what that mission is once we incarnate into a physical body.

This spread is designed to help you remember what that mission is by giving you a snapshot of your life purpose as it relates to spiritual growth, relationships, career and creativity.

1) You in relation to your life’s purpose:
This card can give you an idea of how well you are relating to your life’s purpose – whether you are struggling to find it or living it joyfully.

  • To what extent you are living your life purpose
  • How you are living your life now

2) Your personal life purpose:

  • areas of spiritual growth that you are working on
  • life lessons that you came here to master

3) Your life purpose in your family and community:

  • the role you came to play in your family and/or community
  • how you intend to impact and influence those closest to you

4) Your global life purpose:
This can often be in close relationship to your community purpose.

  • what you came to accomplish on a global level (for example, bringing more peacefulness to the planet, inspiring others to question societal norms or bringing joy and bliss to those who experience your work).
  • How you intended to effect the planet as a whole when you first decided to incarnate into a physical body (your life purpose in the bigger scheme of things)

Now compare card #1 to each of the other three – are they similar? Opposing? How do they interact? Is your current lifestyle in stark contrast to what your original purpose was?
Card #1 will give you clues as to what you need to change in your current life in order to align more closely with your life purpose.

Here is a video demonstrating how to use this tarot card spread:

49 thoughts on “Life Purpose Tarot Card Spread”

  1. I am thoroughly confused.
    10 of Cups
    4 of Wands
    10 of Swords
    Page of Swords
    …all reversed.
    My first thought was did I just shuffle badly and had a chunk of cards that are upside down…I didn’t. I went through the deck and they are pretty evenly mixed.
    I can’t get a positive spin on this. Especially the Page.
    I can’t believe my life purpose is to ultimately be unhappy, so. Any thoughts are very appreciated.
    I’ll meditate on this for a while and try to come up with a meaning.

    1. Hi Ash,
      Thanks for trying out my spread!
      Indeed, this is a confusing group of cards.
      You can always try waiting a week or two and then re-doing the spread, but using all upright cards and see what you get.
      I don’t usually do this, but here’s my on the fly take of your cards:
      10 of cups(reversed) – sometimes you struggle to believe that your dreams are really possible
      4 of wands (rev) – your purpose is to shake things up in your life, and not to fall into too much routine or complacency. your purpose is to find a sense of “home” inside yourself regardless of where you’re at in life or what your circumstances are.
      10 of Swords(rev) – your life purpose in your community may be related to healing and helping others through difficult times
      Page of Swords (rev) – this card is all about navigating the mental aspect of life (things like mental focus, mental well being, etc) As you overcome these kinds of struggles in your own life, you learn things that you can share with others. This actually fits well with the 10 of swords.
      Hope this resonates and makes a bit more sense 🙂

  2. Hi, thank you so much for this spread! I’m new to Tarot and am a bit confused by my results. Wondering if anybody can point me in the right direction?

    1: 6 of Cups (my childhood looms large in my life)
    2: 3 of swords (healing from my childhood has been my life’s purpose)
    3: Queen of Pentacles (I’m an awesome mom and that was purposeful)
    4: Queen of Wands reversed (whuuu?!)

    I completely understand the first 3 cards but that reversed Queen has me confused.

  3. hellooo~
    i’m fairly new to tarot and this is my first life purpose reading on myself that i decided to because i’ve been quite depressed lately about not knowing my purpose in this life.
    may i have an opinion of my cards please ?
    #1 fool
    #2 VII swords
    #3 V wands (reversed)
    #4 VI coins/pentacles (reversed)

  4. Hi, I just used this spread yesterday with my brand new deck.
    Can someone help me decipher the #4 spot: Global Life Purpose: I pulled The Star 17.
    I was hoping for a bit more clarification.
    Thanks

    1. It would be nice to know the other 3 cards you drew with The Star. I think this is a very auspicious card to have as your Global Life Purpose. The Star brings with it both the qualities of the sun and the moon to create a new earth. The meaning of this card is simply hope and guidance. We live in a very troubling time in this world’s history and we need leaders who can bring hope and guidance as we navigate our way forward as the human race. Now this doesn’t mean you need to become the leader of all the people of earth to have an impact. But within your sphere of influence you can always bring hope and guidance to those around you to help them see the bigger pictures in their life and like a star help lead them through trials and tribulations. Maybe The Star card landed hear to indicate you should become a professional Tarot reader and use those skills to bring hope and guidance to people. Also a professional counselor, a pastor, a spiritual guide, a doctor, working regularly with the homeless … The Star will guide you in whatever way you choose to use your gift. Blessing and best wishes to you on your journey.

  5. Hello I thought the 9 of cups was about your so call wish coming true which I didn’t felt it meant that but in books and other psychic that s what they said “wishes”?

  6. I like this spread alot because it focuses on multiple life purposes and not just one path as we all have purposes on different levals. So thank you for making a spread showing that.
    I used the Mary-El Tarot for this spread as I thought it would be appropriate. This is my spread, which turned out interesting. Ill write a little on each card. I plan to do one again for more insight but for now….

    1. King of Disk- at the moment taking life too seriously and not expressing enough joy.
    2. Page of Cups-Working on right living and intentional creative living and owning my power/personality.
    3. 9 of Cups-Be a channel of love, bring humor to others and lightheartedness.
    4. 8 of Cups-be a good role model, live right, use my strength for the good of all and teach others to heal and forgive.

    Ive got much to journal about this spread. Just amazing insight! Thank you so much.

  7. Card one- Judgement
    Card two- Temperance
    Card three- The Emperor
    Card four- The World

    Please give me some insight. It made me tear up a little bit. Very positive reading.

    Chelsey

  8. Kate, I tried this reading today.

    My results: using The Wildwood deck

    1. Three of Vessels – (Joy)
    2. Seven of Stones – (Healing)
    3. 13 The Journey – (Transformation)
    4. Ace of Bows – (Spark of Life)

    Mainly I wanted to ask about card two – family and relationships – could be my relationship with myself; how I need self-forgiveness in how I’ve treated myself?

  9. Hi Kate I did a life purpose and was wondering what you thought

    1.The Hanged Man
    2.Ten of wands
    3.Four of wands (reversed)
    4.The Queen of Cups (reversed)

    I’s a little confused by the Hanged man and the reversed cards and was hoping you could clarify for me thanks kindly.

    1. So intriguing, Jeff Camire! Did you work it out? I have only just found this site . so answering rather late ;). Anyhoo – I saw this as a lovely affirmative spread of a beautiful & currently much needed life purpose. Here are my thoughts :
      *Hanged man .. the ability to be calm & relaxed while looking at deeply rooted beliefs in a new way or from a different perspective, leading to a deeper understanding and/or finding answers that were hidden before, to attain transformation .. Is this you .. or is this what you are putting off doing – procrastinating through lack of confidence . . or holding on to many deep rooted beliefs (through habit/ upbringing) which obscure your vision & impede your progress?
      *4 of wands (reversed) .. by looking at tense or difficult situations from a different perspective you can instil calmness and confidence and find the hidden reasons to celebrate
      *Queen of Cups (reversed) .. You are able to live the wonderful queen of cups energy where others may fail, because you see are able to look at life’s conventional situations calmly and confidently from a different perspective.
      So to me these are in alignment with the the Hanged Man – the ability to find hidden answers/ achieve transformations by your ability to calmly see deep rooted situations from new or different perspective.

      1. Gail, Lovely reading on his spread ???????? I really liked some of you out-of-the-box interpretations. They’re similar to mine.

  10. I love this spread, it gave me a beautiful, insightful reading. Through analysis I feel the cards embody aspects of my personality perfectly though I think the overall message is that it is safe for me to express who I truly am, that I should leave that which no longer serves me in the past and stops me from living fully in this moment. (For fear of emotional rejection!)

    1. King of Swords
    2. Eight of Cups
    3. The Sun (made me smile)
    4. Queen of Cups

  11. Hello Kate,
    I just did the life purpose spread and got the following:-
    1 – the high priestess
    2 – the magician
    3 – the wheel of fortune
    4 – three of pentacles

    I have a pretty solid idea of what the cards are telling me, but am interested in you opinion if that’s ok?

    Jax

  12. I did this spread on myself, my husband and my brother-in-law. Really enjoyed it! Here’s my personal interpretation on the spread I did for myself.

    1) 2 of Pentacles: Currently balancing family, work and trying to fit time in for new spiritual endeavors. Balancing many things at once. Could possibly point to the advantages of moving for business.
    2) 7 of Wands: This speaks to me about standing up for what I have worked for, what I believe in. Standing up for myself has always proven to be difficult. I believe this card is about summoning inner strength.
    3) Ace of Wands: Speaks directly to sharing my creativity (music, art, passion, inventions, love) with my family / community.
    4) 8 of Wands: I’m not 100% on this, but I believe it may be pointing to my passions take me to new places, spreading gifts and teaching others?

    1. Hi Sara,
      Thanks for trying out this spread and posting your results!
      I loved your interpretations and I think you’re bang on with what you said about the 8 of Wands 🙂

      Cheers,
      Kate

  13. For myself this is what showed:
    Card 1: The Hanging Man
    Card 2: The Devil
    Card 3: Page of Cups
    Card 4: The High Priestess

    I feel a vibe from this reading, however it would be nice to have someone help me interpret this combination. Anyone willing to help me? It will be greatly appreciated.

  14. Hi there!
    I just did this reading and got:
    1) the tower reversed
    2) the nine of wands reversed
    3) the ace of pentacles
    And 4) the fool

    I’m struggling with card one. I’ve gotten the tower reversed a couple times now recently in my readings and I feel as though the tarot is trying to tell me something but I still dont intuitively know what it is. Any ideas on how to read this heavy card and reversal? Would love and so appreciate any feedback.

    Thanks!
    Bridget

  15. I just got the weirdest reading for this

    1st card – Death (change transformation)
    2nd card – Two of Worlds (Reflection)
    3rd card – Sage of cups reversed (Regenerator Reversed? Destroyer?)
    4th card – Strength Reversed (no purpose?)

    Cant make heads or tails of it lol.

    1. Hi Andrew,
      Gosh, that is weird! I don’t usually read with reversals. I don’t think that you have no purpose, though – that just can’t be right! I have thought about this and honestly can’t figure out what it means either. Here’s some questions to ponder: what is your relationship to strength in your day to day life? Do you consider yourself strong or weak? How do you feel about expressing or experiencing weakness? Do you work with people who are experiencing weakness? Maybe it indicates working with people who lack confidence and strength (like a social worker or advocate of some kind)?
      Let me know if you figure it out 🙂

      Kate

      1. lol Ive been thinking about strength and I think it means 1 I get to choose my path by what I do, 2 I should be using grace and not excessive strength/power when handling the world. I think the 3rd card is being supported by loved ones, receiving regeneration rather than giving it. I consider myself strong but weak at the same time, I’m powerful but I haven’t access to most of that power, I’m strong emotionally but have little containment on raw emotion. I am spiritually strong in the sense of I can endure a lot of heartbreak and emotional suffering, but I’m weak in the sense of physical and pain endurance. As for helping those that need it well the whole of humanity needs help and so does the natural world.

        Some background may be necessary now this is going to be weird but I’m a young spirit who actually is a goddess(or whatever you want to call it) placed in human form, for what I’m not sure yet but I think its to do with the great awakening of humanity, the reintroduction of humanity into the greater outer planer community. Told you it was weird lol

  16. Can you help me understand this reading of mine?

    Judgement
    page of rods
    eight of swords
    the moon

    I understand most of them except for the moon card (the last card, global life purpose) can you help?

    Thank you kindly 🙂

  17. Hello, I did the Life Purpose Tarot spread, it came out good, but I didn’t really understand it. I am just asking if you could help me understand what the cards were trying to say…I got:
    1. Justice
    2. 5 of Wands
    3. 3 of Swords
    4. Queen of Swords (then I drew another card to understand better and it was 2 of Pentacles)
    Thank you for your answer.

  18. I done a life purpose spread and I would like to invite anyone who wants to interpret as they see it. The number will correspond with the position listed above.
    1. The Star
    2. 4 of swords
    3. 3 of cups
    4. queen of sowrds

  19. Linda Terramiggi

    Every morning I go to your Tarot spreads link and one. I find that I understand the cards just a little more day using your tips and comments to do the reading. My past life and Connecting with my Spirit… layouts were so clear I thought “Oh my gosh! I can read the cards!” 🙂 – Today’s layout was Life’s purpose, and again – with your tips and comments on what to look for and what to ask yourself, gave me a reading I totally understood and could connect with! Thank you! Sometimes we second guess ourselves and need just that little bit of confirmation to know we are – on the right path! If I have interpreted these correctly – I am, on the right path! Thank you!

    1. Ace Pentacles
    2. Queen of Wands
    3 Strength
    4. Queen of Swords
    (I totally love your keyword for #4 – It’s me in a nutshell) Although 3 and 4 were reversed, I did read them right side up)

    Have a great day!

    1. Linda, I am so happy that your using my spreads and its helping you with your readings! This is so wonderful to hear 🙂 Thank you for letting me know, as this is the whole reason I created my website and its good to know its working!
      That’s great that you feel more confident in your abilities as a reader now.
      Happy Tarot Reading,
      Kate

  20. Hi everyone 🙂
    Firstly I would like to thank you Kate for such a great spread and being such a great help and influence on my journey with the tarot.

    Anyway I just did this spread for myself and I found the results interesting.
    For the first card I got the 5 of pentacles, the second the 5 of swords, 3rd the fool and lastly the 6 of wands. And I am curious to hear on anyone’s opinion of these cards as the 5 of swords seems to be a very negative card in regards to life purpose?

    1. Hi Jodie! I am so glad your finding my website helpful 🙂
      You could see the 5 of Swords as indicating conflict – thus your purpose might have to do with healing conflict and helping others heal conflict and resentment (for example, as a counsellor or mediator).
      Cheers,
      Kate

  21. Hi there… I’m a bit confused on this reading … Can you clarify and tell me what you think?
    Card 1. 4 of swords
    Card 2. 4 of wands
    Card 3. Death
    Card 4. 6 of pentacles

    1. Hi Laura,
      Sorry I don’t do interpretations here anymore – but maybe someone else that reads this can give you their take on it 🙂
      Cheers,
      Kate

    2. 1–you are in a spot where you seek solitude in order to regroup from the stresses of your past. you are evaluating a complete abandonment of past ways and need seclusion to work your way carefully through the myriad of choices.
      2-you are actually battling your desires (this can also be seen as a lawsuit against your current of just-previous employer before moving toward your ultimate life purpose). either way, there’s a bit of conflict going on with regard to the choices you are weighing… as if the alternatives are so opposite that everyone you know is advising against your changing careers in such a drastic way
      3–The death card here is a sign that you are going to clear away everything from the old career to make way for a new one; you are afraid of this and may tend to make yourself sick with worry, afraid of losing financial security and the support of your family.
      4–Ultimately, I see you as destined to be a benevolent individual. Your quest will not be one of money… it will be one of good works, charitable acts… kindness. You won’t get rich at it but you will find extreme satisfaction in helping others and you will feel heart-rich.

      I’d love to hear your feedback on this.

  22. Trina Dela-Curva

    Hello Kate,

    Having just done the life purpose spread, I used the Soho Zen deck. Would you kindly unspoken understand the meanings here? I’m still far from being sufficiently familiar with it, and readings on a whole.
    Thank you in advance for any guidance you could share.

    1st card Schizophrenia
    2nd Patience
    3rd Harmony
    4th Inner voice

    1. Trina, those are some lovely cards you chose. I won’t go into detail here, but in a nutshell, card #1 shows that you may feel torn between two major things when it comes to your life purpose. Card #2 shows that an area of personal growth that you are working on is Patience – allowing things to happen in their own time. Card #3 indicates that you have a harmonizing, calming presence in your community and family, and card #4 suggests that your global mission involves listening to your intuition and perhaps even teaching and inspiring others to do so. Hope this helps! Do you have the Osho Zen book that comes with the deck?

Leave a Reply to Kate Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Please check your email to confirm your subscription