Tarot can teach you about yourself; help solve problems; inspire you to make the most of your day; unpack what's going on in your relationship, and if you have a tricky choice to make, shed light on the real issues involved. But first you have to learn the meanings of the cards. And there are 78 of them, which can be overwhelming when you first start. This month, I again picked a card at random to share its meaning.
Strength - Rider Waite Deck - Major Arcana
The tarot Major Arcana cards are numbered 0 to 21 (22 in all). They symbolise the important lessons in life, such as love, death, balance, achievement and sacrifice. The Strength card is card VIII or 8.
It shows a young woman dressed in white with a garland of flowers in her hair and more flowers round her waist. She has a gentle, kind, patient expression and the infinity symbol or lemniscate above her head (figure of eight).
But she is patting a lion and closing his jaws! And the lion seems to be enjoying the attention. He looks more like a large contented dog than a fierce beast. The two are in a natural setting, bathed in yellow light. There is a mountain in the background.
Some key words for the Strength card are: surrender, patience, compassion, soft control and well, strength. But this is inner, not outer, strength. A strength that comes through mastering our base emotions (symbolised by the lion) such as anger, lust, impatience, rage and arrogance.
The woman represents our higher self. She doesn't use force to close the lion's jaw, rather she tames the inner beast with patience, wisdom and kindness. An important lesson, especially for fire signs, but everyone experiences feelings of rage and anger.
The Strength card teaches us that roaring is not always the best way forward. Instead, get outside in nature, take a few deep breaths and be kind to yourself. This too shall pass.
Here are my Strength card interpretations for the three most common tarot questions/situations - work, love and health.
1) WORK/MONEY
Sometimes we get angry, sometimes we get frustrated and sometimes we just let our lower nature get the better of us. We’re human. If you’ve had fantasies of killing your boss or punching your co-worker, give yourself a break. Things are not going your way at present. You are being asked to cultivate patience and compassion towards yourself. Hard. Yes of course it is. That’s what the Strength card is all about!
2) LOVE/RELATIONSHIP
You cannot control the situation you are in at the moment. And although you probably feel angry, frustrated or worse, there’s not much you can do about it. Accept you are powerless and stop trying to force matters. The strength you will develop comes through acknowledging and accepting your own weakness.
3) HEALTH/WELLBEING
Stop trying to force things. Calm down and let go. Difficult? Yes of course it is, but you won’t achieve anything by getting angry except high blood pressure! The key to good health is patient acceptance of your situation and acknowledging and accepting your own shortcomings.
If you have a deck of tarot cards, pull out the Strength card, take a good look at the picture and think about what it might mean for you.