Seven of Wands Energy
when we wear two different shoes
The past few weeks I’ve been deep in study on cults and monsters and there is more to come but I just couldn’t put out a negative feeling piece last week, for reasons which I am sure are quite obvious to you, my readers. When times get rough, I take a number of measures to ensure my sanity, my safety, my mental health. I burrow under, I reach out to friends, I pull tarot cards for guidance. I hope you are doing the same. This morning I pulled the Seven of Wands, and the energy felt appropriate, and the time felt right to return to some tarot thoughts this week. If there is ever a tool which shores me up when I am down it is tarot.
The Seven of Wands represents overwhelm and defensiveness but also strength and capacity. Since last Wednesday, those attributes well describe my position. I find myself called to refer back to Rachel Pollack, who died last year, who was one of the foremost experts on Tarot, and whose book Seventy Eight Degrees Of Wisdom, is one of four or five books I would recommend to anyone with an interest in the tarot. I didn’t realize until I read her obituary in the NYT that she was trans, that she was a pioneer and activist who died at the tarotically (yes, I invented this word!) ironic age of seventy-seven, and that she even created the first trans superhero. Pollack says about the Seven of Wands that “The theme of awareness comes in with his knowledge that he must stay on top; he cannot relax. The combination of seven and wands pushes him into a situation where he has to keep active.” (Rachel Pollacks’s Tarot Wisdom, p.303) Just reading this sentence makes me want to crawl back under the covers and sleep for ten hours. That is the overwhelm. But Pollack reminds us, and now understanding better her life in terms of her activism, that even when we are emotionally spent, we can’t forget the fiery wand of action. We may well need some time to recover but then we get back up and we defend what is right.
Michelle Tea, author of The Modern Tarot, has a similar take as Pollack, and is also an LGBTQ+ activist. She says: “When the Seven of Wands comes up, you’re probably having to defend your position, whether it’s a role someone is trying to knock you out of or a belief you need to stand up for regardless of how contested it might be.” (p.160) Again as tired as we may all feel, this isn’t the time to pretend it isn’t happening, This is the time to double down and defend ourselves. As a proud resident of Washington State, I was so happy to see the legal team our current AG, and soon to be Governor, Bob Ferguson, has put together to address what can be addressed in real time as the next administration unfolds. I find myself thinking about his preparation and energy, and he feels very Seven of Wands to me.
But what do we make of the way Pamela Colman Smith drew this figure with two different shoes? Tea admits she doesn’t know what to make of it. Pollack alludes to it in her interpretation using a few other decks than the Waite-Smith. I think the two shoes are pivotal here because they add a nuance to this card which otherwise would be pretty black and white. When we wear two different shoes, it might feel uncomfortable or awkward, not quite right. It might indicate that in our overwhelm we’ve lost focus, even on just getting dressed. These two different shoes indicate that we may need to look at the world differently, we may need to open our hearts and minds in ways which make us feel uncomfortable. I don’t know what this looks like in my own life yet. I do know I comfortably move to the Leo’s position of battle, and I might need to look at ways to approach 2025 which make me a little uncomfortable, out of my rage filled comfort zone.
My next door neighbors didn’t go so far as to put a Trump sign up, and I don’t know if they voted for him. But they did erect signs for the Republican gubernatorial candidate as well a Republican Senator position—both of whom lost. I like my neighbors. We don’t hang out, but we’ve built fences together, text each other if something looks off on either of our properties, their children are lovely, we swim in the same pool. They are my neighbors. I don’t hate them, and I don’t think they wish me any ill will. I certainly don’t wish them any. I have a hunch they might have voted for Trump, and I may talk to them about it. I’ll have to sort that out.
This to me feels like the two shoes. I want to hate the whole thing, to throw the baby out with the bath water, to throw my hands up in disgust and do a little name calling. But the other shoe has dropped and now isn’t the time for that. It feels like a time to be curious. Not to say I’m going to stop defending what I think is right. But I need to understand and not beat up the other side for their opinions. One thing for certain that I’ve learned in my study of groups which are “cultish,” is that the theory of linguistic performativity holds true: that language doesn’t reflect reality, it actively creates reality (Montel).
I sincerely hope we can all look at our own language over the coming months, as well as read and study as much as our nervous systems can healthily handle, to learn about the other shoe, and quite possibly to recognize we are also wearing it.
All my love,
xoHanna