What is Opening of the Key Spread
One of many ways to use tarot cards to get a deeper insight into reality and what is going around. This article is not meant to be a full tutorial on how to use this spread, rather a quick reference.
Paul Hughes-Barlow introduced me to OOTK (Opening of the Key) spread and instead of repeating all his words, I will just link to books, websites, and youtube channel, check out Useful menu group. OOTK (Opening of the Key) spread.
Explore card string in Blog of Thoth – Academy
Card splitting
OOTK spread has specific way card should be cut, depending on the question/problem specific pile is taken and analyzed.
| Stack 1 | Stack 2 | Stack 3 | Stack 4 | |
| Step 1. | Full deck | |||
| Step 2. | Top half from column 4 | Remaining bottom half | ||
| Step 3. | Top half from column 2 | Remaining bottom half | Top half from column 4 | Remaining bottom half |
| Tetragrammaton associations | Heh | Vav | Heh | Yod |
| Correspondences | Material | Thoughts | Emotions | Personal |
Card values
| Cards | Count | Upwards | Downward | Change direction | Comment |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aces | 5 | Clockwise | Counterclockwise | Five elements | |
| Knight, Princes | 4 | Counterclockwise | Clockwise | Yes | Four letters of YHVH |
| Queen | 4 | Clockwise | Counterclockwise | Yes | Four letters of YHVH |
| Princesses | 7 | Clockwise | Counterclockwise | Yes | Seven palaces of Malkhut |
| Minor cards | 2-10 | Clockwise | Counterclockwise | ||
| Fool, Aeon, Hanged man | 3 | Clockwise | Counterclockwise | Three mother letters | |
| Zodiac cards | 12 | Clockwise | Counterclockwise | Twelve signs of the Zodiac | |
| Planetary cards | 9 | Clockwise | Counterclockwise | Seven planets plus moons |
How to choose direction
There is no hard rule when choosing a direction. You can use Upwards, Downwards columns from the table as starting direction, you can also choose clockwise or counterclockwise or go in both directions to get more insights.
Changing direction
Let’s say you have 7 Wands Valour Upwards, you will count to 7 clockwise, you stop on 10 Disks Wealth downwards – you will still keep the same direction and count 10 clockwise.
Only court cards change counting direction. Let’s say you have 7 Wands Valour Upwards, you will count to 7 clockwise, you stop on Knight of Disks Upward – you will change direction to counterclockwise and count 4 to next card.
And don’t forget to include current card into count.
Counting steps
- Choose any card from the spread
- Decide direction: clockwise or anti-clockwise
- Find selected card count in the table.
- Count in a selected direction, including starting card.
- If you landed on the card that you have visited previously and from the same direction, the string ends.
- If you landed on the card that you haven’t visited, go to step 3.
Visual card strings
Using described rules I created a website where you can enter the string of cards and it will display all strings.
You can also press “Random” button to get a random string of cards and observe all relations and different strings.
To get more information about arrow colors and how to enter your own card string into text area, read instructions in “Instructions” tab.
Explore card string in Blog of Thoth – Academy
String with multiple independent strings
String with court cards changing directions
Several times found strings with 3 independent strings. Don’t forget to share interesting strings that you find, or if you get string with 4 or more independent substrings.