3 of Swords is a card of suffering and heartbreak. It’s one of the most viscerally affecting of the cards, in my opinion; you don’t have to know a thing about the Tarot to understand instantly that 3 of Swords is painful. It’s interesting that a card that is so deeply emotional is in the suit of air, which is about communication—the way we talk to ourselves and to other people, what information we encounter in the world, what stories we subscribe to—and not in the suit of Cups/water, which is where we find issues of the heart. Visually, 3 of Swords has a lot of resonance with the 2 of Swords (referring here in particular to the ‘classic’ illustration in the Rider-Waite-Smith deck). In the 2 of Swords there is something we don’t want to see (the figure is blindfolded), or feel (the swords are crossed over the heart space). 3 of Swords still shows those 2 crossed swords, yet there is a third sword coming in to pierce that stalemate, bringing in new information that forces a confrontation, forces us to see and to feel. It is a painful but necessary revelation and reckoning. So, yes, we are feeling pain in this card, but we are also *finding out*. The only way out of the energy of this card is through. And because of its correspondence to the Empress (the Major 3, and a card of unconditional love and acceptance), I think that in many ways, 3 of Swords shows us the pain inherent in loving, and that it is through suffering that we grow our capacity for empathy.