Queen of Swords

Queens represent our sovereignty over our own experiences. Swords are the suit of communication and truth, and detail our struggles with our inner narrative/self-talk and mental health. The court cards of the suit of Swords show various ways we wield this power of the mind. Queens of Swords possesses great inner authority: they* know their truth, they own their story, and they do not allow themselves to be manipulated. Now, this is not to say that this Queen is illogical or will not listen to reason. But they would, for instance, not fall for an attempt at gaslighting. This would be wonderful archetype to call upon if your experience is being questioned or doubted in any way: Queen of Swords does not insist that you wage a fight against those who doubt you, but won’t let you second guess yourself. You know what you know! Your experience is your experience! This Queen also demands discipline regarding our own mental health. Because of the nature of sovereignty, they must patrol and maintain their own boundaries. So if you are engaging in behaviors that you know damn well cost you peace of mind (staying up til 2 AM on Twitter anyone?), Queen of Swords can come along to ask that you shore up those boundaries to keep order within their realm. 

*I use they/them pronouns for all court cards, because gender is a construct! 

4 of Cups

Four of Cups is a card of emotional digestion. Much is said about the figure in this card refusing the cup that is being offered, and there are suggestions that he is being petulant and bratty. While that *can* be the case, it’s good to explore the reason behind that refusal. There are 3 cups on the ground, the contents of which we could infer that this character has already consumed. Perhaps this person is just really *full*, and they need to sit and wait on this new offering until they have the capacity for it, both literally and figuratively. It is not wise to binge on anything, right? Not only can you make yourself sick, but at some point you stop enjoying the whole experience. You become numb to the flavor of things. Even if you *want* to keep saying ‘Yes!’ and ‘More!’, eventually you have to concede that you just need a break. You have to allow what you’ve already taken in to process, digest, and absorb. Our hearts can be like sponges; holding so much they become heavy and can make our energy leaden and even depressed. We can misinterpret that for emptiness, when it is just the opposite. We can wonder what’s wrong with us that we have no *appetite* for life when it is just that we are full. This card tells us that it’s wise to give ourselves that time away from the ‘buffet of the heart’ so to speak, and allows us to trust that when our appetite returns, more will be waiting for us. 

Wheel of Fortune

Whenever I pull this card I think of the song ‘Turn! Turn! Turn!’. The lyrics were pulled almost exclusively from the 3rd chapter of the Book of Ecclesiastes:

To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, a time to reap that which is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
A time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to gain that which is to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time of love, and a time of hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.

When this card comes up in a reading it indicates a shift in circumstances—the winds of change are blowing. It also tells us that there is little we can do to influence the outcome. Wheel of Fortune energy is *big* energy. So essentially, it asks us to stay focused on what work is ours to do, immediately and directly. It is so common, when we feel the winds of change begin to stir, to fall into a sense of helplessness and allow our daily tasks and routines to suffer. Wheel of Fortune is an opportunity to stay focused on the here and now. It means fixing our gaze to the stable center of the wheel, so to speak, to avoid the dizzying and disorienting blur of the spinning in progress. 

9 of Swords

9 of Swords is a card of anxiety, fear, of lost sleep, and expecting the worst. It can feel really confrontational when it shows up in readings, but it’s important to remember that every card carries both a reflective element and a medicinal element within it. So while the 9 of Swords might show that you’re having the above experiences, it also offers the way through them. I think what all 9s in the Tarot ask of us is to make an inventory. I think of the Major card that’s numbered 9, the Hermit, and this archetype’s relationship to both self-determination, deliberate action, *and* the ability to navigate through darkness. The Hermit’s lantern casts a pool of light on one thing at a time, which is why it speaks so strongly to intentionality and pacing. In the 9 of Swords, we can draw upon these qualities to shine the light of our awareness on each of our fears in turn. Instead of being the figure hiding their eyes from the shadow-monster in the corner, we can aim our light upon it to determine that it’s just a pile of laundry. And we can do this with each of our fears one by one, literally writing them out so that they become pinned down under the light of our awareness rather than growing in our imaginations (and we’re working here well within the realm of swords, which has to do with the written word, our consciousness, and our imagination!). Make a list of “what-ifs” and see if they begin to recede like shadows. 

8 of Wands

8 of Wands is a current of energy. As the only card in the Minor Arcana* that doesn’t show a person (or a part of human anatomy—looking at you 3 of Swords), it tells us that this movement and momentum, this push of energy, is largely beyond our control. However, the alignment of these wands also tells us that it’s in our best interest. Things here are literally ‘lining up’ and ‘falling into place’. Our ‘job’ when 8 of Wands comes up is to surrender to it. This is an energy that doesn’t last forever, but if we can drop into that current then we can be pushed towards something beautiful. 8 of Wands asks us to remain hopeful, and to notice opportunities to say YES (and then say “yes!”). 

*at least in the most popular Tarot deck, the Rider-Waite-Smith, which has heavily influenced the illustrations of basically all modern decks. Many earlier decks had ‘unillustrated’ minor cards, similar to playing cards. The Sola Busca Tarot is the earliest known deck (we’re talking 15th century) with illustrated minors, plenty of which don’t show human beings, but this deck doesn’t have the influence of the RWS in modern Tarot culture. 

Page of Cups

Pages in the Tarot invite us to get curious. Some decks have renamed them ‘students’, and they approach things with a beginner’s mind. They’re often referred to as youthful, which has nothing to do with age, but with their whole attitude towards life. I don’t believe Pages are naïve, but they are certainly not jaded. When we are working with Page energy, we are open to reimagining what is possible, and open to the reinvention of our experience. Page of Cups then, could be considered the ‘student of the heart’. We can sit with our feelings here with a non-judgmental curiosity about what they have to tell us. Cups are the suit of water, and I often imagine feelings rolling in and out like the tide. This Page wanders up and down the shoreline, delighted with the treasures the tide has brought in. Bits of memory, old hurts and resentments like fragments of shell and sea glass. This Page gathers them all up and marvels at the stories they have to tell. Page of Cups offers us so much healing, because they come to the heart without an agenda or preconceived ideas about what things mean. They allow us to metabolize old wounds so quickly because they can reframe through play and story, art and song. When this Page comes up in a reading it can indicate the need to process experiences creatively. It can also suggest that you take your inner child out to buy a set of Legos, or whatever it is that allows that tender emotional self to feel safe and nurtured.