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laura andersson

re the fool:
so does this mean, if using the tarot for growth and self-analysis, that each time i get the fool card represents another new turn of the SPIRAL of personal evolution/awakening?


Hi Laura --

That's a great way to look at the Fool! Maybe you could think of this part of yourself as being like a newly-hatched baby check, ready for what's coming, but not quite sure what that means yet.

Also, you can see the Fool as "after the end but before the next beginning", which assumes a kind of *out of time* feeling about this image. When I'm getting the Fool, I often feel emptied out and formless, kind of like a lump of clay before it's moment on the potter's wheel. One is between identities, pure potential.

laura andersson

Hello Christine.
With respect to The Tower (XVI) & The Lovers (VI), i am having trouble w/ understanding both of these cards in recent & long-term readings.
I think I will separate these into two questions.
First, THE TOWER: having an aquarian moon [with jupiter conjunct in the first house] & also an aquarian ascendant for my husband, we feel we "live" the tower in the sense that it seems to be "the lightning bolt of truth". From readings and personal observation, it seems that those w/ strong emphasis of aquarius in their astrological charts can handle more "voltage" aka truth = tower relative to other signs. This means that the physical expression/actuality of the Tower in expression has less of that "ground being cut out from under one's feet" feeling/impact and more of an "oh yes, i see" feeling. I could simplify and say that some people need their truths "sugar-coated" and others can handle the dose straight...
i do find that this card in a reading is not a forecaster of any negative, but more commonly works akin to the hermit in a time for contemplation and self-examination. In fact, it is often positive, as the old, unwanted detritus is cleared, just like cleaning out the debris in the flowerbed.
.... aha. maybe, only "lies" are torn down by the tower, so if one is willing to accept this, then it is not uncomfortable?

thank you,


Hi Laura --

Yes, I think that's the point. If you build your Tower ~for~ the lightning, then it will be "enlightening" when the system is activated. And hopefully any occupants of the Tower will be adequately protected and insulated.

If instead you build your Tower *against* the lightning, then you will feel under attack every time heavy weather blows up.

Remember that the Tower is a construct, a set of assumptions cemented together to elevate the point of view and gain access to a large vista. Many years of man-hours are required to create it, and sometimes the designer and builder are dead before the true purpose of it is tested. The person who sits at the top has the benefit of countless human laboreres and past efforts underfoot.

Even so, having a strong Tower doesn't make one invulnerable, any more than having a car means you don't need a coat! The location of the Tower in the sequence suggests that we are present for a Battle of the Titans, between the organic electricity of the Earth Herself and the stubborn, arbitrary (stony) will of humanity (collectively). This is not a personal issue, it is a transpersonal issue, as befits a card from the Third Septenary.

Hence when I see the Tower coming up in a spread, I counsel that the person head down to ground level and find a shelter away from the epicenter of the action, and I mean this philosophically as well as physically. If Nature and the Tower are going head to head, there's plenty of "aha" energy around even if one doesn't stand right on (or in) the bull's eye!

There's no virtue in putting delicate, fleshy human individuals into the maelstrom over a cultural or generational issue. Too often they are rent asunder by the turbulence set loose when the immovable object meets the irresistable force. There is danger is thinking "I can handle what others cannot". Sometimes one will get away with it, but remember, it's the "crowned one" who falls out of the top of the Tower when the lightning hits. That means, the best and brightest get sacrificed by the sacred bolt.

Only the humble survive, because they weren't up there trying to ride out the storm!

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