Tarot Card of the Day - September 15, 2016

Date: September 15 2016

Today's Tarot Card: The Devil

Of all the cards in the tarot, the Devil is one of the most feared - and misunderstood. In the card in the Rider Waite Smith deck, you can view the Devil prominently placed in the center. Over his head is an inverted pentagram, which represents the material over the spiritual. He holds his hands similar to those of the Magician - "as above, so below" - an expression found in the beginning part of "The Emerald Tablet" by Hermes Trismegistus, which signifies the interconnectedness, as well as the similarities, of everything within us and around us: the macrocosm and the microcosm, man and "God", material and spiritual, mundane and magical and so on. On this 16th card of the Major Arcana, numbered XV (15), this card also shows a man and woman chained to the post that the Devil is perched upon. The chains around their necks are loose, which suggests that they can be easily removed if they only think about it.

When this card shows up in a reading, it typically represents those things (people, places, events, actions) that "bind us", chain us, keep us down and preventing us from being our best. They are the addictions that claim our time, our resources, our souls. They are the obsessions that blind us to the reality of life. They are the self-inflicted fears and anxiety that prevent us from being a part of society, from fulfilling our life's purpose and has us spiraling into our own personal hell. However, as with the card, these things are of our own making, which means the manner to set us free is also within our reach and control - if we can just open our eyes and hearts enough to see that we hold the key to unchain ourselves from our own "demons" and no longer be a servant to its' whims. This card says that now is the time to be free. You have the ability and the means. It is time for you to remove the shackles and come in to the light.