WTF Is Tarot

by Bakara Wintner

  Regardless of how we choose to meet The Hanged Man, he comes into our life and demands transformation, and it is specifically because of his closeness to Death that this transformation is possible. In Justice, we reached the apex of our analytical mind’s potential; in The Hanged Man we transmute it altogether for the sake of going further. Because there is a feeling we cannot shake that there is something “more.” Ideally, we willingly enter this sometimes uncomfortable initiation to discover what we are capable of becoming.

  A snake does not mourn the loss of its old skin, nor does the caterpillar lament its chrysalis. There is wisdom found in the animal kingdom in their relationship to transformation. Resistance of The Hanged Man and the denial of Death are connected to the ego, which animals do not possess. It is only when we hold on for too long that this natural process becomes a place of suffering. It is interesting that to achieve a heightened state of consciousness we must set the ego aside in favor of something more primal than we’d care to admit and more divine than we can fathom. To grow, you must outgrow.

  While The Hanged Man is a male archetype, in many ways he is the ultimate testament to the potency of feminine power. In this place of non-action, receptivity and surrender we change beyond what we ever imagined possible, a change that could never happen by manipulating or forcing an outcome. It is one of the most perfect examples in the tarot of something femininity does perfectly and that masculinity cannot scratch the surface of.

  Every time I see The Hanged Man card my impulse is to turn him around, not because I don’t know he’s chilling exactly how he’s supposed to, but because my brain wants things right side up. Society’s response to this archetype is similar, and The Hanged Man can be met with criticism or bewilderment for his unusual views.

  The health benefits of inversion are many—hanging upside down can relieve back pain, improve brain function and posture, increase circulation, strengthen your legs and core and clear your complexion. However, our bodies are meant to be feet-first on the ground, and if we stay there for too long we risk serious medical problems. The Hanged Man is not meant to be inhabited indefinitely. Detachment is necessary at times, but getting stuck in this energy can lead to depression, indifference and alienation.

  Like a snake shedding its skin, The Hanged Man sheds only what is ready to leave us. When we let go of something, it should never feel like we are hacking off one of our own limbs. The tarot will not ask us to do something we are incapable of. In The Hanged Man, whatever we are leaving behind is also leaving us. It is the morning we wake up after a debilitating breakup and our ex isn’t the first thing we think about when we open our eyes. It is an obsession that loosens its grasp, a spell that breaks. Ultimately, The Hanged Man brings freedom through expansion.

  Anecdote

  My relationship with my ex was dying long before either of us was ready to admit. It was no one’s fault, or it was both our faults, or maybe it was the world’s fault; there are so many things I can point to as possible reasons, but the facts were the same. We were roommates, best friends, dog co-parents and family, but the thing that makes a romantic relationship tick, that elusive but essential lifeblood, was gone. It left somewhere along the way, or we failed to properly nurture it. When we finally acknowledged this, we spent months trying to heal the damage and get back to a better place. When we couldn’t do that, we went on a break—an ill-conceived, desperate attempt to hold on to each other that ended up hurting both of us even more.

  The break was intended as a space for us to change in the ways that were required for our relationship to work again. It was a doomed mission. We spent most of it hating each other. He moved out and then I moved out and back in and then out again. I kept postponing the end-date we’d set to get back together because the idea of it sent me into a panic, but I also wouldn’t look for a new place to live because it meant we were really over. This resulted in months of couch surfing, heartache, listlessness, fear and depression. I shut down my heart because it was too painful to feel it. I was a cold, removed, semi-robotic version of myself.

  I don’t regret this insane period of my life, but we sometimes wonder about the pain we could have saved ourselves by skipping the break and just letting it end.

  In a Reading

  Getting ready to release something. Letting go. Becoming aware that something in your life is dying. Coming to terms with death. Surrendering completely to an experience, even if it hurts. Suspending action and decisions. Resisting change. Suffering due to non-acceptance. Slowing down. A paradigm shift, or change in how we perceive reality. Depression. A sign to stop pushing against the current. Evolution or transformation, but the kind that happens by allowing it, not that you have to catalyze or control. Initiation—letting something end for the sake of eventual new beginnings.

  13—DEATH

  Grieve. So that you can be free to feel something else.

  —Nayyirah Waheed, Nejma

  transition / loss / natural / leveling / transformation / freedom / bare / impartial / return / refinement / letting go / metamorphosis / closure / release / bridge / inevitable

  Card Meaning

  With Death, we arrive at one of the most dreaded cards in the tarot. Because it is a card that has so much fear and negativity associated with it, readers are quick to dismiss the grittiness of Death and explain it as rebirth or transformation. The instinct is a kind one, but to do so does not fully honor the gravity of this card and cheapens the experience for people going through it. Yes, Death facilitates transformation. Yes, there is a natural rebirth that this cycle enables. But for either of those to take place, the dying needs to happen. It’s a loss, and a significant one, and it probably fucking sucks. Even if it is graceful, dignified and right, there is inevitable pain that accompanies it.

  Rarely does Death symbolize the physical death of a person, and I strongly advise exercising caution about interpreting this card literally. Usually, it shows up to signify the death of a relationship, job, behavior or part of ourselves. The spiritual concept of dying before you die is explored across religions and faiths, typically encouraging people to not shy away from the opportunity Death provides us to live a fuller, more authentic life.

  The comfort of Death is that whatever is passing is no longer meant to live. It could be said that in Justice we have discovered what needs to die, in The Hanged Man we let go of it and in Death it leaves us. In addition to grief, there is often a sense of relief and rightness that accompanies this experience. When we defy death, when we hold on to something that no longer wants to be possessed, we still do not get to keep it. The thing in question will calcify, embodying The Devil’s toxicity and destructive qualities before it is eventually shaken loose through The Tower. Knowing that something is meant to end does not necessarily make the ending easier, but it does provide context in a space where we could otherwise be swallowed whole by our grief.

  It is human nature to avoid pain, but after Justice we passed the point of being beholden to just our human nature. This is a point that many people do not pass. They reach Justice and live in it, meet their mortality at The Hanged Man and experience Death once, at the end of their life. To achieve Justice is no small feat, for it allows a life of integrity, values and balance, and it is no one’s place to pass judgment on people who take this path. However, Death is far from the last card. Allowing this energy into our life makes room for the glorious cards yet to come. In my experience, they are not to be missed, and it is worth feeling all the pain that Death brings with it in order to continue on.

  Anecdote

  It will come as no surprise that the break with my ex did not end in us getting back together. I came to the house to see Zadie one evening, and we were sitting on the back porch when I told him that it wasn’t going to work. I had no intention of saying it, no plan of coming over and putting us out of the misery of this break, but before I could formulate the thoughts, I was honest with him and myself for the first time.

  I loved him. I was so
afraid that I would never find love like that again. Never feel as at home and at ease with someone as I did with him. I told him that I loved his family and the family we created together over the last three and a half years. I told him I knew we could survive this break and get back together, and it might be fine for a while. But if I didn’t leave now, I knew in the deepest part of myself that I would leave eventually, it was only a matter of when. It was information that came from a clear, true, ruthless voice inside me that would not be quieted or quelled.

  After the animosity of the last few months, I expected a fight. He was quiet for a long time. And then he looked me in the eye and thanked me for finally setting us both free.

  Everything I wouldn’t let myself experience, the distant and unfeeling place I preserved myself in during our time apart, immediately melted, and I felt my heart break. It literally, viscerally felt like I took a sledgehammer and smashed the shit out of my heart. We spent the next three days in the house crying, holding each other, talking, processing and grieving. I could finally feel my love for him without resentment or hostility because I no longer needed him to be someone he wasn’t. The grace, tenderness and consideration for each other in those few days spent together in mourning will forever be one of the most difficult and beautiful experiences of my life. While the pain was so extreme at times I was sure I would be crushed under its weight, there was no thought of reversing our decision, no wondering if we made a mistake. He is still one of my favorite people, closest friends and the best dog dad a girl could hope for.

  In a Reading

  I would be remiss to not discuss here how sensitive, painful and just overall soul-crushingly shitty the Death card can be for people. When this card shows up in a reading, I encourage the person I’m reading for to fortify themselves with support. This is going to suck. It’s going to feel surreal. Reach out, take care of yourself, get support, seek solace in ritual, give yourself space to grieve, don’t try to pretend like everything is okay. It’s not. But it eventually will be. Something is dying, and yes, it’s really over, even though that feels impossible.

  14—TEMPERANCE

  Wear your halo like a hat, that’s like the latest fashion I got angels all around me they keep me surrounded.

  —Chance the Rapper, Angels

  alchemy / moderation / balance / magic / divine protection / duality / gnosis / blending / sobriety / the middle way / devotion / guidance / grace / guardians / angels / healing / calm

  Card Meaning

  Temperance is a difficult energy to pinpoint because it manifests as the moments we have come into contact with grace and where spirit has intervened on our behalf. Therefore, we grow to understand Temperance in the things that didn’t happen more than events that have come to pass. The person who was late to work at the World Trade Center on the morning of September 11th, who stayed home sick from school the day of the shooting. Every path we didn’t take, every near miss, every calamity we never knew we avoided can be attributed to the angelic protection of Temperance.

  In Temperance, we are standing in the presence of our guides, angels and ascended masters. We faced Death and are standing in its afterglow—where fire and water blend—where the pain has burned off, and we are left only with the healing and lightness of what we’ve made room for.

  Traditionally representing virtues like moderation and sobriety, Temperance brings us back to balance in a way that is patently different than Justice. Where Justice wields her sword to pair down, Temperance calls for adding ingredients to achieve harmony. Sobriety is, by definition, an abstinence from a material ingredient. However, the use of substances could be considered a thing that subtracts, as it limits an individual’s capacity and prevents true presence and connection. In Temperance, matter is not commensurate to value. We can add ingredients that detract from a larger whole, just as we can subtract destructive and divisive forces to make something more complete. When I fell in love for the first time, it was a softening of every hard thing in me, but nothing was lost. What left me was sharpness, masks, defenses that I thought protected me but only kept me small and separate. What it made way for was a fullness, presence and an unprecedented sense of peace. This was a graceful dance, an effortless negotiation, the most potent yet gentle physical sensation of magic and alchemy I’ve ever experienced. In either case, Temperance does not use a sword to make these adjustments. Perhaps where Justice cuts, Temperance melts.

  Justice is a mastery of our decision-making processes, whereas Temperance speaks to a utilization of the Higher Self, which surpasses cognition. A calming and healing presence, we can call upon her to aid in forgiveness, quell hysteria, diffuse volatility and enable creative problem solving.

  We develop a relationship with Temperance when we begin to believe that the game of life is rigged in our favor. Her grace allows us to see the inherent benevolence of the universe. It is a Source that we can cultivate an immediate relationship with. She both reminds us that we are safe and ensures that safety on our behalf. There is an exalted, almost ecstatic energy Temperance brings when we allow her to work with us.

  Temperance can come into our life as a divine intervention, or signify a visitation from a departed loved one or spirit guide that wishes to make their presence known. A friend’s mother once found an old raincoat from her father’s company in a store. Before discovering it, his favorite Frank Sinatra song came on and she could smell him in the air.

  Positioned as the last card of the Major Arcana’s second row, we are again brought to the precipice we first met at The Chariot. What kind of graduation does Temperance mean for us? If The Chariot is going off to college, then Temperance could be the completion of our PhD in life.

  With all of this blissful angelic realness set aside, we cannot ignore that The Devil is the very next card. What meaning is added to Temperance when we consider its positioning? Perhaps its speaks to the precarious nature of her perfection. Or, it could be the solidifying agent for the spiritual foundation we need to face the deep-rooted and complex issues presented in The Devil.

  Anecdote

  I was a rebellious, addicted and suicidal teenager. Memories of my high school experience are mostly swallowed up by a black hole of depression and wishing that I didn’t exist. With over a decade between me and my teenage years, I can safely say it was more than teen angst. I do not subscribe to the concepts of good and evil, but I was wrestling with something dark and karmic and destructive and powerful during that period of my life, and it was winning.

  My mother was an addict and eventually took her own life as a result of her disease. While I was definitely a full-fledged addict by the time I was sixteen, there were some hard and fast rules I set for myself to justify my behaviors and, beyond that, differentiate myself from my mother. No hard drugs (loosely, loosely used definition) was rule number one. By the end of the first semester of my senior year in high school, I was ready to cross that line.

  Every morning on the way to school my deadbeat friends and I would get supremely high, and it was a Friday shortly before Thanksgiving when I decided to buy some of the aforementioned hard drugs to take at a party that night. It would have been my first time.

  When my dean and two police offers walked into my third period AP English class to escort me out, I was still too high to realize what was going on. In a dumb, dreamy state I watched them search my car and line up the contraband on the asphalt while a white moth—a symbol I’ve always associated with my mother—landed on my backpack.

  I will never know what would have happened had we not been caught on our high school’s security cameras that morning, still smoking a bowl as we pulled onto campus. There is a horrible possibility that lives alongside me getting arrested, going to rehab and getting sober that I did not have to live out, or die from.

  In a Reading

  Spiritual, divine or angelic intervention. Direct contact with your guides and masters. Being protected or overseen by a benevolent energy. Mediumship, a message from a departed
loved one will make itself known through Temperance. Returning to your center. Choosing the middle way. Avoiding extremes. Combining different elements to achieve equilibrium. Finding the right mix. Adding elements rather than taking things away to solve a problem. A harmonious merging of seemingly opposing energies. A time of harmony and balance. A feeling of exhilaration, well-being, health and lightness after Death.

  15—THE DEVIL

  The soul is restless and furious; it wants to tear itself apart and cure itself from being human.

  —Unknown

  perversion / distortion / imbalance / addiction / succumbing / enslavement / blocked / vices / bondage / insidious / indulgent / seductive / karmic / deep-rooted / consumption / suffering / oppression / hedonism

  Card Meaning

  Another greatly feared and widely misunderstood archetype, The Devil brings us face to face with our deepest defects. The cycles we could not break in The Wheel of Fortune, cut away with Justice or surrender to Death reach their fever pitch in this difficult card.

  We aren’t still holding on to these blocks due to laziness or deficiency. This is some primo shit. Our bodies grew around these blocks. They reside in the very marrow of our bones, are embedded in our souls and our psyches. They are wounds we were born with, or that were inflicted early and often, before we could properly defend and protect ourselves, and have since festered and metastasized. Now they are so insidious that we often confuse them as facts of who we are. There is no quick fix, no neat extraction for The Devil. When it leaves us, it is under fire. The Devil unearths these wounds for us so that they may then be seared away by The Tower, and honestly it’s probably going to be a hot mess.

  The Devil is a relationship gone toxic, whether it is with a person, substance, behavior or object. It is the perverse relative of The Lovers and a false iteration of The Sun. Manifesting as addiction, abuse and excess of all sorts, we do not fully appreciate the power of The Devil until first coming to terms with his insidiousness. The Devil is not a monster that jumps in our path baring his teeth and snarling at us. If he did, then we’d be like, “Damn, I better get this under control.” Rather, The Devil makes us think that he is our friend. That he alone protects us, understands us, comforts us and keeps us safe. People are very attached to their Devil. You will often hear alcoholics say, “Alcohol wasn’t my problem: it was my solution.” The moment we start to question this is the moment we begin to invoke our own freedom.