Rider-Waite-Smith Tarot · The Self

Subject14 entries

Tarot · Suit of Cups

Seven of Cups

Illusion and the Labyrinth of Choices

The dazzling and deceptive realm of the imagination, where myriad desires cloud spiritual discernment.

What it meansSeven cups rise on cloud, holding a face, a shrouded figure, a serpent, a castle, jewels, a wreath and a dragon. Waite calls them reflections. Not one of them is a thing in the world, and the card's warning is that desire renders its objects beautifully.

Tarot · Suit of Cups

Ten of Cups

Divine Harmony and Wholeness

Lasting emotional fulfillment, family harmony, and peaceful domestic joy shared with loved ones.

What it meansThe ten cups are in a rainbow, which is a sign in the sky and not a possession. The family below it is dancing with their backs to us. Read as the completion of the suit: feeling arrived at its natural end, which is other people, and held only as long as the light lasts.

Tarot · Major Arcana

The Chariot

Willpower, Direction, and Victory

Opposing forces held to one direction by will alone — the ego's triumph, and its aggression.

What it meansThe sphinxes are black and white and pull opposite ways, and the charioteer holds no reins. He governs by attention alone. The victory is not over an enemy but over a contradiction he refuses to resolve — he drives both, and stops driving the moment he looks away.