Tarot for Taking Back Your Power
A Study of the Eight of Pentacles
image: a person in a vr headset and a wax print frocked shirt. they have on a sweater. the background is a glitched sky.
What happens when the docile posture of the figure on the Eight of Swords is our best choice?
The Eight of Swords is what happens when trauma has you in a rut, and you can't admit it.
What happened wasn't your fault. That's what makes changing your life so hard. Why should you be the one to clean up the mess someone else made?
Well, what's the other option?
Honesty is a habit. It's not a virtue, not an inborn trait. I suspect this is especially true for artists.
As a poet, this pressure is sharp. I don't want to tell thee truth, I want to tell a truth. Maybe even the truth at the center of a lie.
Life imitates art. You can't convince me otherwise.
What we do not see, what we cannot dream, we will not be.
This is why we need artists, the best liars society has to offer. Conversely, the most truthful people in any society.
How do we manage this? By balancing watching and doing. By balancing truth and artifice.
I've mentioned before that I'm SURROUNDED by Cancers. My partner and closest friends, all tropical Cancers. All Cancer artists, I should say.
But they insist on an honesty too complete to be true.
This mirrors the question presented by the Eight of Swords. Conventional, or traditional, meanings asks us to see learned helplessness in this card.
What if what we're looking at is felt witness, intuitive witness, or event the refusal of honesty. What if what we're looking at is confusion.
What happens when the Eight of Swords comes up as sitting with? Can passivity, or rather the illusion of passivity, ever be a strength?
As a domestic violence survivor several times over, I know that seeing is dangerous.
Growing up in a household that rang with punches was desensitizing. I came of age thinking that if no one was arrested, if we didn't lose our housing, there was no abuse.
At twenty-four years old, watching a partner throw his phone through a wall, I snapped out of this idea. It was sudden. I could see inside the structure of our rented rooms. I had no clue what might happen next.
I shallowed my breathing. I softened my voice.
I worked as hard as I could to calm him down. I didn't think about how this was only the beginning, because I didn't know how to extricate myself.
I could only live moment to moment.
When things are spiraling out of control, it's understandable to take the stance of the Eight of Swords.
The blindfold the figure is wearing could be shock. It could be confusion. It could be internalized isolation.
Everyone wants survivors to immediately jump up and walk away, Eight of Cups style. This is rarely possible.
The Eight of Swords presents the freedom to allow the blindfold to lower over time. The Eight of Swords allows you to shimmy out of the ropes that bind you so slowly it seems you are standing still.
This could be what it takes to make it to the hard healing process the Nine of Swords presents.
The Eight of Swords can pop up when we know something is wrong intuitively, but can't put our fingers on it.
In these cases it's better to take a beat and listen to your wise mind, rather than acting without all the information available. Such moments ask us to be still and listen for a sign that it's safe to make a move.
Not all information received intuitively needs an immediate response.
Sometimes the information comes so we are aware, not because we need to change our lives right away.
Intuitive information may come to us so we can plan the next step. It may fall on us because we need to start the slow process of changing our lives.
We don't have to try to beat all life's challenges in a footrace. Sometimes intuition is simply a heads up. Sometimes, as much as it sucks, there's nothing we can do to improve our lot beyond being aware of what's to come.
It's informative that the Eight of Swords emerges from the rapid action of Seven of Swords. If immediately rushing in worked, you wouldn't be moving through the Eight of Swords at all.
The Seven of Swords can make us feel like we're getting away with something. The Eight of Swords shows you why the actions of the Seven of Swords rarely win in the longterm.
In fact, the Eight of Swords may find you trapped by hastily decided past actions. It opens up an excellent time to evaluate what didn't work about prior decisions.
What happens when we are able to open ourselves to the Eight of Swords as a space of planning and review?
What emerges when we invite the Eight of Swords as a site of consideration, rather than a punishment?
Further Thoughts
5 Pillars of Tarot for Liberation
Understanding Tarot’s Acolytes, Part 2
hey, i'm cyree jarelle. I run Collective Cartomancy. I help queers, feminists, and leftists connect with their intuition using tarot and cartomancy. More on me.