The seven-card Horse Shoe is a convenient, basic layout that can be used to answer different types of questions, especially concerning questions where insight would be helpful. Like several other spreads, it has cards representing the past, present, and future.
The pinnacle of the Horse Shoe, looking like the top of the mountain, shows the obstacle or challenge that needs to be addressed and overcome. Card #6 suggests a course of action to meet this challenge. The final card shows the outcome or future, should this advice be followed.
Other clues are provided in Cards #3 and #5, which indicate hidden or outside influences that come into play, affecting the journey to your goal.
Obstacle  The Anchor |
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Hidden Influences  The Key |
External Influences  The Stork |
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The Present  The Lilies |
Suggestion  The Clouds |
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The Past  The Child |
The Outcome  The Lady |
The Past Card represents past events that are affecting the question.
The Child
The Child indicates youth, inexperience, naiveness, playfulness, and small size. The appearance of the Child may foretell a child coming into your life.
The Lilies
Development of the soul, success, conscience, holiness, and learning to accept good traits and bad. The Lilies signify a happy period accomplishment.
The Key
Understanding, truth, knowledge, advice, probabilities, and possibilities. The Key means that you have what it takes to move on to another level.
The Anchor
Lifestyle, foundation, roots, gravity, and security in work or relationships. The Anchor indicates a firm base of success and profit from your endeavours. Now is a good time for you aggressively work towards your goals.
The Stork
The process of cleansing one's self. The stork is a deliverer. It delivers the message of card that occurs before it to the card that appears after the Stork. The ever-evolving nature of love.
The Clouds
Doubts, secret fears, worries, and weakness. A negative period of time on the horizon. It is suggested that you use this period of down time to your advantage by contemplating your situation and meditating on possible ways to fix the issues that may have caused the problem.
The Lady
The Lady represents you if you are a woman. All cards in your spread are interpreted by their distance to this card.
If you are a man this card represents a strong woman with good intent who will have a positive influence on you: a friend, wife, significant other, girlfriend, love. Could also indicate intuition, passiveness, instinct, or patience.