All spreadsCritical situations

Mimir's Head

Eight cards on the northern story: Odin came to the well for counsel and paid for it with an eye. The spread gives a direct answer and names its price.

Take it for one blunt, costly answer to a single deep question, not a gentle overview.

Cards
8
Minutes
12
Reversals
On
AI reading
3 credits
12345678
Lay out this spread

Cards and meanings are free. An AI reading of this spread costs 3 credits.

How to read it

The two upper cards are your question: first the one you spoke, then the one standing behind it. They are almost always different, and the spread answers the second. The middle row is the water of the well: what you already know and will not admit, what is hidden from you, and what the answer will cost. The price is not a punishment but a condition: knowledge changes a life and cannot be given back. The next two cards are what you gain and the head's plain counsel; read the counsel literally, it is rarely polite. The bottom card shows how it ends if you follow it.

Positions

  1. The question you asked

    How you phrase your own question and what that phrasing says about you.

  2. The real question

    What you are actually asking about, underneath the convenient wording of the first.

  3. What you already know

    The truth you have known for a long time and refuse to say out loud.

  4. What is hidden

    The circumstance or someone's intention that you do not and could not see.

  5. The price of the answer

    What this knowledge costs: peace, an illusion, a relationship or your former role.

  6. What you gain

    What appears in your life in exchange for what you gave, once you accept the answer.

  7. The head's counsel

    Plain counsel without consolation: what exactly to do, not what to feel.

  8. If you follow it

    How the story ends if you take the counsel and pay the named price.

More spreads: Critical situations