The Emperor is a card that modern Tarot has really expanded and made much more accessible. Old school approaches have this card representing the father, the masculine, structure and discipline, and often a rigid, non-emotional way of engaging with the world. While some of these interpretations certainly have resonance, this archetype is now seen as a statement of the unapologetic “I AM”; claiming your right to be here, not trying to shrink yourself, and allowing yourself to be seen. The Emperor asks us to step forward and say who we are, what we are capable of, and what we want and know that we deserve, without offering excuses or justifications. But, this card’s associations with discipline and its shadow element of entitlement are key here, for we cannot claim the Emperor’s energy rightfully without having put in the work to earn it.
As card 4, it is ‘container energy’. It asks us to give ourselves structure and boundaries so that we can experience the sense of filling up that container, of having and being enough.
For example, as a self-employed person, I would often work as much as possible, which paradoxically made me feel like I never had *enough* work. Without parameters on my schedule, I never had a sense of it being FULL. I had to learn to turn my schedule into a closed container—here are the hours I fill with work, here are the hours outside of work—so that I could see it filling up, giving me a sense of “enoughness”. That is a practical example of Emperor energy, and the way it asks us to offer ourselves an opportunity to fill up space and experience a sense of our own sufficiency.