Tarot Reading What lies in my future?
Reading Performed 11/11/2019 at 12:54 AM
Click or scroll down for the meaning of each position and the interpretation of its card.
Visual Layout
Card One
Strength from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Despotism, abuse if power, weakness, discord, sometimes even disgrace.
Card Description
A woman, over whose head there broods the same symbol of life which we have seen in the card of the Magician, is closing the jaws of a lion. The only point in which this design differs from the conventional presentations is that her beneficent fortitude has already subdued the lion, which is being led by a chain of flowers. For reasons which satisfy myself, this card has been interchanged with that of justice, which is usually numbered eight. As the variation carries nothing with it which will signify to the reader, there is no cause for explanation. Fortitude, in one of its most exalted aspects, is connected with the Divine Mystery of Union; the virtue, of course, operates in all planes, and hence draws on all in its symbolism. It connects also with innocentia inviolata, and with the strength which resides in contemplation. These higher meanings are, however, matters of inference, and I do not suggest that they are transparent on the surface of the card. They are intimated in a concealed manner by the chain of flowers, which signifies, among many other things, the sweet yoke and the light burden of Divine Law, when it has been taken into the heart of hearts. The card has nothing to do with self-confidence in the ordinary sense, though this has been suggested--but it concerns the confidence of those whose strength is God, who have found their refuge in Him. There is one aspect in which the lion signifies the passions, and she who is called Strength is the higher nature in its liberation. It has walked upon the asp and the basilisk and has trodden down the lion and the dragon.
Card Two
Justice from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Equity, rightness, probity, executive; triumph of the deserving side in law.
Card Description
As this card follows the traditional symbolism and carries above all its obvious meanings, there is little to say regarding it outside the few considerations collected in the first part, to which the reader is referred. It will be seen, however, that the figure is seated between pillars, like the High Priestess, and on this account it seems desirable to indicate that the moral principle which deals unto every man according to his works--while, of course, it is in strict analogy with higher things;--differs in its essence from the spiritual justice which is involved in the idea of election. The latter belongs to a mysterious order of Providence, in virtue of which it is possible for certain men to conceive the idea of dedication to the highest things. The operation of this is like the breathing of the Spirit where it wills, and we have no canon of criticism or ground of explanation concerning it. It is analogous to the possession of the fairy gifts and the high gifts and the gracious gifts of the poet: we have them or have not, and their presence is as much a mystery as their absence. The law of Justice is not however involved by either alternative. In conclusion, the pillars of Justice open into one world and the pillars of the High Priestess into another.
Card Three
Nine of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Prudence, safety, success, accomplishment, certitude, discernment.
Card Description
A woman, with a bird upon her wrist, stands amidst a great abundance of grapevines in the garden of a manorial house. It is a wide domain, suggesting plenty in all things. Possibly it is her own possession and testifies to material well-being.
Card Four
Nine of Wands from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Obstacles, adversity, calamity.
Card Description
The figure leans upon his staff and has an expectant look, as if awaiting an enemy. Behind are eight other staves--erect, in orderly disposition, like a palisade.
Card Five
Eight of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Bad news, violent chagrin, crisis, censure, power in trammels, conflict, calumny; also sickness.
Card Description
A woman, bound and hoodwinked, with the swords of the card about her. Yet it is rather a card of temporary durance than of irretrievable bondage.
Card Six
King of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Vice, weakness, ugliness, perversity, corruption, peril.
Card Description
The figure calls for no special description the face is rather dark, suggesting also courage, but somewhat lethargic in tendency. The bull's head should be noted as a recurrent symbol on the throne. The sign of this suit is represented throughout as engraved or blazoned with the pentagram, typifying the correspondence of the four elements in human nature and that by which they may be governed. In many old Tarot packs this suit stood for current coin, money, deniers. I have not invented the substitution of pentacles and I have no special cause to sustain in respect of the alternative. But the consensus of divinatory meanings is on the side of some change, because the cards do not happen to deal especially with questions of money.
Card Seven
Three of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Metier, trade, skilled labour; usually, however, regarded as a card of nobility, aristocracy, renown, glory.
Card Description
A sculptor at his work in a monastery. Compare the design which illustrates the Eight of Pentacles. The apprentice or amateur therein has received his reward and is now at work in earnest.
Card Eight
Queen of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
The accounts vary; good woman; otherwise, distinguished woman but one not to be trusted; perverse woman; vice, dishonour, depravity.
Card Description
Beautiful, fair, dreamy--as one who sees visions in a cup. This is, however, only one of her aspects; she sees, but she also acts, and her activity feeds her dream.
Card Nine
Five of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
The card foretells material trouble above all, whether in the form illustrated--that is, destitution--or otherwise. For some cartomancists, it is a card of love and lovers-wife, husband, friend, mistress; also concordance, affinities. These alternatives cannot be harmonized.
Card Description
Two mendicants in a snow-storm pass a lighted casement.
Card Ten
Five of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
The same; burial and obsequies.
Card Description
A disdainful man looks after two retreating and dejected figures. Their swords lie upon the ground. He carries two others on his left shoulder, and a third sword is in his right hand, point to earth. He is the master in possession of the field.
Card Eleven
Six of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Declaration, confession, publicity; one account says that it is a proposal of love.
Card Description
A ferryman carrying passengers in his punt to the further shore. The course is smooth, and seeing that the freight is light, it may be noted that the work is not beyond his strength.
Card Twelve
Nine of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Truth, loyalty, liberty; but the readings vary and include mistakes, imperfections, etc.
Card Description
A goodly personage has feasted to his heart's content, and abundant refreshment of wine is on the arched counter behind him, seeming to indicate that the future is also assured. The picture offers the material side only, but there are other aspects.
Card Thirteen
Ace of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
House of the false heart, mutation, instability, revolution.
Card Description
The waters are beneath, and thereon are water-lilies; the hand issues from the cloud, holding in its palm the cup, from which four streams are pouring; a dove, bearing in its bill a cross-marked Host, descends to place the Wafer in the Cup; the dew of water is falling on all sides. It is an intimation of that which may lie behind the Lesser Arcana.
Card Fourteen
Knight of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Utility, serviceableness, interest, responsibility, rectitude-all on the normal and external plane.
Card Description
He rides a slow, enduring, heavy horse, to which his own aspect corresponds. He exhibits his symbol, but does not look therein.
Card Fifteen
Nine of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Death, failure, miscarriage, delay, deception, disappointment, despair.
Card Description
One seated on her couch in lamentation, with the swords over her. She is as one who knows no sorrow which is like unto hers. It is a card of utter desolation.
Card Sixteen
Ace of Wands from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Fall, decadence, ruin, perdition, to perish also a certain clouded joy.
Card Description
A hand issuing from a cloud grasps a stout wand or club.
Card Seventeen
Five of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
It is a card of loss, but something remains over; three have been taken, but two are left; it is a card of inheritance, patrimony, transmission, but not corresponding to expectations; with some interpreters it is a card of marriage, but not without bitterness or frustration.
Card Description
A dark, cloaked figure, looking sideways at three prone cups two others stand upright behind him; a bridge is in the background, leading to a small keep or holding.
Card Eighteen
Four of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Novelty, presage, new instruction, new relations.
Card Description
A young man is seated under a tree and contemplates three cups set on the grass before him; an arm issuing from a cloud offers him another cup. His expression notwithstanding is one of discontent with his environment.
Card Nineteen
Ten of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Whatsoever is intimated by the design; also pain, affliction, tears, sadness, desolation. It is not especially a card of violent death.
Card Description
A prostrate figure, pierced by all the swords belonging to the card.
Card Twenty
Ace of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
The evil side of wealth, bad intelligence; also great riches. In any case it shews prosperity, comfortable material conditions, but whether these are of advantage to the possessor will depend on whether the card is reversed or not.
Card Description
A hand--issuing, as usual, from a cloud--holds up a pentacle.
Card Twenty One
Queen of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Widowhood, female sadness and embarrassment, absence, sterility, mourning, privation, separation.
Card Description
Her right hand raises the weapon vertically and the hilt rests on an arm of her royal chair the left hand is extended, the arm raised her countenance is severe but chastened; it suggests familiarity with sorrow. It does not represent mercy, and, her sword notwithstanding, she is scarcely a symbol of power.
The Meanings of these Tarot Cards
Card One
Strength from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Despotism, abuse if power, weakness, discord, sometimes even disgrace.
Card Description
A woman, over whose head there broods the same symbol of life which we have seen in the card of the Magician, is closing the jaws of a lion. The only point in which this design differs from the conventional presentations is that her beneficent fortitude has already subdued the lion, which is being led by a chain of flowers. For reasons which satisfy myself, this card has been interchanged with that of justice, which is usually numbered eight. As the variation carries nothing with it which will signify to the reader, there is no cause for explanation. Fortitude, in one of its most exalted aspects, is connected with the Divine Mystery of Union; the virtue, of course, operates in all planes, and hence draws on all in its symbolism. It connects also with innocentia inviolata, and with the strength which resides in contemplation. These higher meanings are, however, matters of inference, and I do not suggest that they are transparent on the surface of the card. They are intimated in a concealed manner by the chain of flowers, which signifies, among many other things, the sweet yoke and the light burden of Divine Law, when it has been taken into the heart of hearts. The card has nothing to do with self-confidence in the ordinary sense, though this has been suggested--but it concerns the confidence of those whose strength is God, who have found their refuge in Him. There is one aspect in which the lion signifies the passions, and she who is called Strength is the higher nature in its liberation. It has walked upon the asp and the basilisk and has trodden down the lion and the dragon.
Card Two
Justice from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Equity, rightness, probity, executive; triumph of the deserving side in law.
Card Description
As this card follows the traditional symbolism and carries above all its obvious meanings, there is little to say regarding it outside the few considerations collected in the first part, to which the reader is referred. It will be seen, however, that the figure is seated between pillars, like the High Priestess, and on this account it seems desirable to indicate that the moral principle which deals unto every man according to his works--while, of course, it is in strict analogy with higher things;--differs in its essence from the spiritual justice which is involved in the idea of election. The latter belongs to a mysterious order of Providence, in virtue of which it is possible for certain men to conceive the idea of dedication to the highest things. The operation of this is like the breathing of the Spirit where it wills, and we have no canon of criticism or ground of explanation concerning it. It is analogous to the possession of the fairy gifts and the high gifts and the gracious gifts of the poet: we have them or have not, and their presence is as much a mystery as their absence. The law of Justice is not however involved by either alternative. In conclusion, the pillars of Justice open into one world and the pillars of the High Priestess into another.
Card Three
Nine of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Prudence, safety, success, accomplishment, certitude, discernment.
Card Description
A woman, with a bird upon her wrist, stands amidst a great abundance of grapevines in the garden of a manorial house. It is a wide domain, suggesting plenty in all things. Possibly it is her own possession and testifies to material well-being.
Card Four
Nine of Wands from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Obstacles, adversity, calamity.
Card Description
The figure leans upon his staff and has an expectant look, as if awaiting an enemy. Behind are eight other staves--erect, in orderly disposition, like a palisade.
Card Five
Eight of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Bad news, violent chagrin, crisis, censure, power in trammels, conflict, calumny; also sickness.
Card Description
A woman, bound and hoodwinked, with the swords of the card about her. Yet it is rather a card of temporary durance than of irretrievable bondage.
Card Six
King of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Vice, weakness, ugliness, perversity, corruption, peril.
Card Description
The figure calls for no special description the face is rather dark, suggesting also courage, but somewhat lethargic in tendency. The bull's head should be noted as a recurrent symbol on the throne. The sign of this suit is represented throughout as engraved or blazoned with the pentagram, typifying the correspondence of the four elements in human nature and that by which they may be governed. In many old Tarot packs this suit stood for current coin, money, deniers. I have not invented the substitution of pentacles and I have no special cause to sustain in respect of the alternative. But the consensus of divinatory meanings is on the side of some change, because the cards do not happen to deal especially with questions of money.
Card Seven
Three of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Metier, trade, skilled labour; usually, however, regarded as a card of nobility, aristocracy, renown, glory.
Card Description
A sculptor at his work in a monastery. Compare the design which illustrates the Eight of Pentacles. The apprentice or amateur therein has received his reward and is now at work in earnest.
Card Eight
Queen of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
The accounts vary; good woman; otherwise, distinguished woman but one not to be trusted; perverse woman; vice, dishonour, depravity.
Card Description
Beautiful, fair, dreamy--as one who sees visions in a cup. This is, however, only one of her aspects; she sees, but she also acts, and her activity feeds her dream.
Card Nine
Five of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
The card foretells material trouble above all, whether in the form illustrated--that is, destitution--or otherwise. For some cartomancists, it is a card of love and lovers-wife, husband, friend, mistress; also concordance, affinities. These alternatives cannot be harmonized.
Card Description
Two mendicants in a snow-storm pass a lighted casement.
Card Ten
Five of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
The same; burial and obsequies.
Card Description
A disdainful man looks after two retreating and dejected figures. Their swords lie upon the ground. He carries two others on his left shoulder, and a third sword is in his right hand, point to earth. He is the master in possession of the field.
Card Eleven
Six of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Declaration, confession, publicity; one account says that it is a proposal of love.
Card Description
A ferryman carrying passengers in his punt to the further shore. The course is smooth, and seeing that the freight is light, it may be noted that the work is not beyond his strength.
Card Twelve
Nine of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Truth, loyalty, liberty; but the readings vary and include mistakes, imperfections, etc.
Card Description
A goodly personage has feasted to his heart's content, and abundant refreshment of wine is on the arched counter behind him, seeming to indicate that the future is also assured. The picture offers the material side only, but there are other aspects.
Card Thirteen
Ace of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
House of the false heart, mutation, instability, revolution.
Card Description
The waters are beneath, and thereon are water-lilies; the hand issues from the cloud, holding in its palm the cup, from which four streams are pouring; a dove, bearing in its bill a cross-marked Host, descends to place the Wafer in the Cup; the dew of water is falling on all sides. It is an intimation of that which may lie behind the Lesser Arcana.
Card Fourteen
Knight of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Utility, serviceableness, interest, responsibility, rectitude-all on the normal and external plane.
Card Description
He rides a slow, enduring, heavy horse, to which his own aspect corresponds. He exhibits his symbol, but does not look therein.
Card Fifteen
Nine of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Death, failure, miscarriage, delay, deception, disappointment, despair.
Card Description
One seated on her couch in lamentation, with the swords over her. She is as one who knows no sorrow which is like unto hers. It is a card of utter desolation.
Card Sixteen
Ace of Wands from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Fall, decadence, ruin, perdition, to perish also a certain clouded joy.
Card Description
A hand issuing from a cloud grasps a stout wand or club.
Card Seventeen
Five of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
It is a card of loss, but something remains over; three have been taken, but two are left; it is a card of inheritance, patrimony, transmission, but not corresponding to expectations; with some interpreters it is a card of marriage, but not without bitterness or frustration.
Card Description
A dark, cloaked figure, looking sideways at three prone cups two others stand upright behind him; a bridge is in the background, leading to a small keep or holding.
Card Eighteen
Four of Cups from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
Novelty, presage, new instruction, new relations.
Card Description
A young man is seated under a tree and contemplates three cups set on the grass before him; an arm issuing from a cloud offers him another cup. His expression notwithstanding is one of discontent with his environment.
Card Nineteen
Ten of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Whatsoever is intimated by the design; also pain, affliction, tears, sadness, desolation. It is not especially a card of violent death.
Card Description
A prostrate figure, pierced by all the swords belonging to the card.
Card Twenty
Ace of Pentacles from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Reversed
The evil side of wealth, bad intelligence; also great riches. In any case it shews prosperity, comfortable material conditions, but whether these are of advantage to the possessor will depend on whether the card is reversed or not.
Card Description
A hand--issuing, as usual, from a cloud--holds up a pentacle.
Card Twenty One
Queen of Swords from the Waite Smith Tarot Deck
Card Meaning When Upright
Widowhood, female sadness and embarrassment, absence, sterility, mourning, privation, separation.
Card Description
Her right hand raises the weapon vertically and the hilt rests on an arm of her royal chair the left hand is extended, the arm raised her countenance is severe but chastened; it suggests familiarity with sorrow. It does not represent mercy, and, her sword notwithstanding, she is scarcely a symbol of power.
