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78 Weeks of Tarot: 3 of Swords


Trogon

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For information on what these threads refer to, see this thread;

 

78 Weeks of Tarot - Informational Thread

 

The above linked thread gives suggested dates for the cards as well as links to the individual topics.

 

Some of us may be working through the study in a different order and using different decks. If you have general questions or comments regarding the 78 Weeks of Tarot study group, please post in the topic in the above link.

 

Have fun.

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Deck: Fairytale Tarot

 

Card name: Three of Swords

First impressions:

 

A nightingale perches on a branch of a rose bush, its breast has been punctured by a thorn and it’s bleeding. Its eyes are closed, but it is still singing. Some leaves are green, some shriveled. From a window behind this scene, a melancholy man looks out on the garden, his head propped up on his bent arm.

 

I don’t remember the story. It looks like the nightingale is in love with the rose, and as if the man is suffering from heartbreak.

 

After reading the story:

 

The nightingale literally has her heart broken and dies for no reason (she had thought, wrongly, that the student understood what love was), except that she was true to her ideals about love. What she thought the student felt was in reality just ego. The student’s heart was not affected at all.

 

From the book:

 

Keywords: Emotional pain; feeling stabbed in the heart; sorrow; grief over someone or something you love; a betrayal that shocks you to the core.

 

The Three of Swords is about pain, often in relation to love. Yet there is beauty there too. The story is also about genuine love. We can take joy from the fat that we’ve known love, even when it ends badly. The student says that love isn’t as useful as logic, but it’s love and learning how to love, even if it sometimes involves loss, that makes us truly alive.

 

The original story:

 

The Nightingale and the Rose, by Oscar Wilde

Traditional meanings (from TarotElements.com):

Grief; heartbreak; emotional pain; a parting or ending of a relationship; troubles ahead; emotional disturbance; mental anguish; being over-emotional; prolonged heartbreak; holding onto grief; denial of emotions.

From 78 Degrees of Wisdom, by Rachel Pollack

 

The card is about pain and heartbreak. To true sorrow there is only one response – accept it and go beyond it. We must not push the pain away. We must somehow take it deep inside us until it becomes transformed by courage and love. Acceptance and love can turn pain into joyful memory, an embracing of life.

 

My impressions of the card/story combination:

 

It’s a beautiful and tragic story, and the image chosen for the card works well.

 

At first I didn’t even see that the nightingale was bleeding, and it was shocking to see. The contrast between the student and the nightingale is well done. The nightingale looks so sincere, and the student just looks like he feels sorry for himself. 

 

My take (what I make of it/what I might see in a reading where I drew it):

 

I think I would clearly see betrayal – it’s hard not to hate the student. I really like Rachel Pollack’s take, that what’s important with this card is to take the pain deep inside until it becomes transformed. That idea of taking the pain deep inside is so well illustrated, that now I think I couldn’t help but see that. And it wasn’t an idea that I had had about the card previously. A message of the card would be learning how to handle the pain of betrayal.

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