Queering the Tarot, page 6
TEMPERANCE
The Temperance card is a beautiful, uplifting card of balance and harmony. It is also a problem card for many readers. Balance and harmony seem like straightforward ideas, but it's hard to read those ideas for other people and guess at what balance means to the seeker and what area of their life needs it. As I've matured as a person and reader, I tend to advise people to make sure they're including all aspects of their life when planning their days, weeks, next five years. It is also a card I have come to understand spiritually. This is a card of finding a center to come back to. It's a card of patience, and I find that much more applicable to my spiritual life. If a deity or energy isn't speaking to me, Temperance comes to tell me to be patient. If I am feeling frazzled throughout a busy workday, this card is a reminder to take a step back and move more slowly.
The Temperance card is meant to be calming and affirming on sight. As such, most incarnations of the card include visions of rainbows. From Christian mythology (which the Rider-Waite-Smith Tarot is based on), a rainbow was a promise that God wouldn't drown the whole world again. More straightforwardly, rainbows are a promise that the rain always ends. This card, then, teaches a crucial lesson about staying balanced and harmonious within ourselves and within the world around us. We must remember that the rain always ends, and when we cannot remember that, we need to find that rainbow or promise so we do remember. It is on this note that we begin queering this card.
While balance and inner peace are important for everyone, these lessons from Temperance hit a little harder for those of any marginalized identity, and that brings us right into meeting a seeker's needs in a reading. It's important to recognize how much harder finding harmony in your life and self may be when you're trapped in a situation where you have to be closeted, where you are unsafe, or if you are at a point where you're not even sure who you are or how you identify. Additionally, outside clatter from queerphobic people in our lives and harmful media messages can create a wholly unbalanced self, no matter how hard we work to stay centered. Frequently, if Temperance shows up in readings around those topics, it's likely doing so as a reminder that finding a balance is both necessary and difficult now. There are times, then, that Temperance goes from being a peaceful image of someone filling one cup without depleting another, to being a message of someone juggling those cups and hoping all the water doesn't run out. How we handle that as readers is obviously totally different. The card is a little bit of a wake-up call. Maybe we are trying too hard or juggling when we could be letting things stand still. And in a very straightforward way, we see this card reminding a queer person that self-care is even more important for the marginalized. That seeker should incorporate a meditative practice or a mantra that affirms themselves and their identities, and brings them to a peaceful center.
The Temperance idea of balance shifts slightly when we start looking at our careers. In this case, the card's lesson is that you should be seeking a situation where you can combine the things you love with the things you're good at. That's a balance that should be easy to find, but we don't exactly live in a world where following your dreams is encouraged. Some of us have no idea until later in life that the careers we want are totally doable—you just have to use the skill set you have to make it so. For queer people, it's scary enough to come out and start a life where we can be happy in our body, or romantic life, or both. It is sometimes even harder to admit we want to walk a much different career path than our parents would choose for us. With Temperance though, you can absolutely use your love of painting to make a living if you're willing to teach or take commercial jobs. You can absolutely pursue being queer Oprah if you're willing to use your medical background to work your way up through some medically oriented talk shows. You can absolutely take your skills as an artist to the protest and help others create a picture of a better, more liberated world . . . or just help the other protesters decorate their posters.
There are many different ways to be a queer activist or advocate. Some of us are meant to work within the system to change it. Some of us are meant to write books, make art, or otherwise find a way to increase representation. Some of us are meant to fight on the front lines. Some of us are simply meant to create harmony wherever we go within our queer community. Temperance frequently shows up for that last type of queer seeker as a sign that it's time to move into an activist role within your local community. You are being called on to make the world better by using your own voice and story to motivate and comfort others. This is actually the most common interpretation of this card that I've seen come up with LGBTQQIP2SA+ clients. This interpretation shows that the time to be a simple member of this community has passed. It is now time to ascend into someone who brings peace to the community, whatever that looks like for the seeker.
The Temperance card does speak to moderation as well as balance, peace, and harmony. As we seek to retain balance in our lives as queer people, that means we can't fill one cup by depleting another. You cannot solely pour your energy into activist work or into matters concerning your gender or sexual identity. It is so tempting to do so, I know. I frequently have to pull back from things because I've lost my sense of who I am beyond queer. Even as I, and many of us, make our money, our art, and our lives around queer things, it is important to nurture all sides of that beyond the identity itself. I'm still a sibling, a member of my neighborhood community, and a huge comic books fan. All of that is an integral part of who I am, and if I am getting Temperance a lot, it's usually time to step away from my closet of rainbow flags and jump into the community garden with the kids who live next door.
The most important part of the Temperance card for LGBTQQIP2SA+ people is the concept of moderation. Any queer community has a really rad and probably large sober community within it. Which is to say that many queer seekers are living in sobriety and have a history of alcohol or drug abuse. The literal lesson of moderation within the Temperance card is to monitor your vices and escape mechanisms closely. Drug and alcohol abuse is a fact with any group in society, but I know for queer clients this issue has specifically come up as a reminder not to go too far, or for those in sobriety as a reminder that life balance is ultra-key to continued sobriety. Temperance could also be a clue for you as a reader that the person you're reading for is in sobriety, so be careful how you speak of indulgence or before recommending seeking community in an alcohol-soaked hangout. This is an affirming card for those living in sobriety. There are many other cards that indicate falling off the wagon, so assure them that while they are struggling, there are rainbows in their life they can look to for hope. They can get through this rough patch. Encourage them to use any meditative or mindfulness practice they've picked up, but also assure them (or yourself, if you're just reading for you) that they have done great work and will continue to thrive in sobriety.
Temperance is another Major Arcana card that comes up frequently in regards to sexual and gender fluidity. It's a card of balancing multiple cups, and the lesson or vision of fluidity literally runs through the card. I see Temperance pop up most often in situations where, for example, the person you've been seeing is not a gender you thought you were into, or you started randomly finding new genders attractive. It also tends to show up for genderfluid seekers (like myself), though not as often as a couple of the other cards in the tarot. The lesson here is no doubt to accept this moment, time, or era of fluidity. Maybe it's a permanent part of who you are, but for now just enjoy this feeling, and trust that it will lead you where it needs to.
Temperance is one of the trickier cards to read for someone else. One person's balance is another's chaos. This is arguably one of the most individualized cards in the deck. That makes it a great fit for the rich culture of individuality we see in a good queer community, but does make reading it a bit of a puzzle. You can certainly delve a little deeper and rely on other cards to fill in the bigger picture in those moments. It's important to remember, though, that tarot, like any metaphysical art, isn't always a clear or tangible thing with a clear-cut result. Sometimes you're being called to just sit and simmer on the word harmony and see what springs forth. There is a temptation of modern seers to make our craft legit by assigning it foolproof secular value. Sometimes that just isn't there, and frequently the Temperance card has a deeper, more spiritual message for us that we are commanded to mull over until the clouds part and it becomes clear.
THE DEVIL
In tarot, The Devil is a card that, on first glance, clients normally assume means that someone or something is bad or wrong. The card indicates that a situation is tempting but not good for you, or that an oppressive force is determined to keep you down. This obviously comes from Christian mythos wherein the Devil is evil and Jesus is good. If you look closer at the Bible though, the Devil shows up more as something meant to tempt God-loving folk away from their chosen path and into something else entirely. The what is never clear. Even in non-queered readings, I usually choose to talk about this card as temptation or an alternative viewpoint—one that isn't necessarily bad, but that does need to be weighed carefully against the path laid out in front of you. Other keywords for The Devil frequently include bondage or addiction, so this card can also be an opportunity to break negative cycles.
When queering this card, our first exploration is going to be on what oppressive forces are at play in a querent's life. It's easy to jump to homophobic parents, transphobic employers, and biphobic partners, and, of course, there is a chance that The Devil is indicating these things. The Major Arcana cards frequently want us to delve into and repair our relationship with ourselves. Digging deeper that way, there's a good chance with The Devil that we're looking at internalized queerphobia. We could also be seeing that self-imposed expectations of what being queer means are pulling the client out of whack. I have an email client who lives in a very rural area in a state that's not very progressive. For her, new relationships frequently show The Devil card, and she finally confided one day that she wasn't comfortable moving forward in relationships because it wasn't safe to walk down the street holding hands with her partner. In this case, her town's culture was the oppressive Devil that was keeping her down—but so was the way she internalized it.
Over time, my relationship with The Devil has become more nuanced. I mentioned earlier that this card shows up, not as something particularly bad, just something tempting but not for me. The Biblical Devil (although it's worth noting this figure is never actually called that in the Bible) wants to make us question our faith, strength, and the road we're headed down. Certainly this interpretation of The Devil is applicable to queer people. I have seen non-monosexual and even transgender clients feel tempted to go back in the closet when their dream job or partner shows up, or when a neglectful parent reappears and the client wants to appease them. I have seen people who know they are polyamorous decide to hold off on opening up a relationship because of a number of difficult situations. Now, these choices are not always bad, and if they show up in a reading full of happy cards, we talk about moving at your own pace and making your own choices. When those choices show up in a reading where The Devil shows up, however, it is definitely time to examine if this situation or relationship is pulling you away from being your true self in an unhealthy or constricting way.
As we've queered the tarot, we've seen cards normally held in a positive or affectionate regard become darker or more negative. This was true of The Hierophant and Justice, for example. Queering cards means questioning the positive and negative connotations associated with cards, and that also means some negative cards do become positive. Temptation and indulgence are not always bad. If a client who once struggled to be healthy has been depriving themselves of all sweets or salty treats and gets The Devil alongside cards of balance, my job may be to remind them that balance is key to life. I'd advise they should be easier on themselves about their diet and give in to indulgences once in a while. A common way I've seen this idea manifest in readings for queer clients (and for myself) is in the idea of embracing our spot in the queer community with lots of celebrations at gay bars or house parties full of LGBTQQIP2SA+ people. As long as one is able to do this responsibly, there is nothing wrong with overindulging occasionally while going out. Similarly, if someone has been in the closet or hasn't fully realized their identity until recently, The Devil can show up as a note that it's completely fine and even well aspected to indulge sexually. This can include experimentation, if that time of full realization isn't complete, but can also simply indicate a time where sexual activity is frequent and varied. If the surrounding cards are positive, please feel free to indulge in all the no-strings fun you desire. I personally feel that this is an important part of a human growth process, but we live in a society where owning our sexuality—whatever that sexuality is—is considered wrong. The Devil and I have frequently worked together in a reading to break down some of that sexual repression for clients.
Finally, if anyone reading knows the tarot very well, they might realize there's a word frequently associated with The Devil that I've been avoiding—bondage. That's because I want the idea of The Devil indicating a positive relationship with bondage to have its own space. Of all the aforementioned examples and interpretations of The Devil in a queer reading, the number one way it shows itself as a positive force is when I am working with a client who strongly identifies with either a dominant or submissive role in relationships, and for whom BDSM is a substantial part of their life. In this case, many of the ideas we've talked about—oppression, temptation, allowing for sexuality—feed into the idea of The Devil freeing us or highlighting positive associations with bondage. The Devil can be about a consensually controlling force as opposed to the oppressive energy many see in it. The first few times I saw The Devil surrounded by happy Cups (indicating love) and Wands (indicating passion), I was a little confused. Many years later, it's abundantly clear that when this happens, we are reading for someone who either loves to control or be controlled, particularly in a bondage setting, and we cannot look at that as a solely unhealthy thing when we're pushing for sexual liberation.
Sex positivity and indulgence are not something most societies are comfortable with. Queering The Devil is one of the most important steps to queering the tarot for so many reasons. The milestones and steps in a queer person's life are so different from those for our cisgender and straight friends. That gives us slightly different interpretations of The Devil. It's crucial that we take a sex-positive look at this card, separate from many of the Judeo-Christian ideals that made it into traditional tarot decks and interpretations. Once you're looking at the card through that sex-positive lens, even readings not about sex or relationships take a different spin where that becomes the metaphor. Then we're looking at a story of indulging after a time of having to hold back, or a story of enjoying a position in an area of your life where someone else is leading.
So much of queering the tarot comes down to breaking down our own misconceptions and biases on what relationships should and shouldn't be, or do and do not look like. The Devil is no exception. Not every reading will automatically queer The Devil to make it more positive, though. There are very real oppressors that hold LGBTQQIP2SA+ querents in the negatively aspected view of bondage. There is often harmful temptation meant to pull us off our path. I would be remiss to not bring up the substantial sober community within the larger queer community, and truthfully I have a number of sober clients for whom The Devil shows up in its more traditional form. Many modern readers, myself included, believe that tarot readings should have a more conversational aspect. That conversation is the second key to cracking how to queer this card in your particular reading. The first key is putting on those sex-positive glasses and experimenting with viewing the card from that lens.
THE TOWER
More than any other, The Tower is a card that freaks people out when it shows up in a reading, and there's good reason for that. Traditionally this card indicates destruction and chaos. The Tower brings down an entire life, albeit one we've built on a false foundation. The Tower can and will shake up your whole world. It can bring huge epiphanies that can alter your entire life path. I've seen it indicate literal concerns with one's home as well, which is never what one wants to hear when they sit down for a reading. As I tell every client regardless of identity, it's important to remember that The Tower brings down only the things in our lives that are built on a shaky foundation. It can be really hard to process and deal with the destruction it bears, but it's also an opportunity to rebuild something stronger and better. The Tower can also indicate a major shake-up as opposed to abject destruction; for those whose lives have become mundane or for people who've become complacent about less-than-great circumstances, this card can actually be a relief if you're willing to reshape your whole world.
Queering The Tower starts with looking at what those specific shake-ups or false foundations might be for an LGBTQQIP2SA+ person. If one has chosen or is forced to remain closeted or even just quiet about their queer identity, it's possible this card is predicting that an unfortunate outing or confrontation might occur. Like with our straight and cisgender seekers, we can see a major relationship falling apart, so knowing the culture of queer relationships is important when addressing this reality of The Tower. When queering the tarot, the querent or their partner might find that they are the one about to tear down The Tower by coming out. I've seen this most often with gender transitions and poly identities. The relationships in their lives could change dramatically, and in many cases could even be ending. Sometimes the truth hurts. As a reader I strive for empowerment, but The Tower is usually not kind. Few things in life are totally bad or totally good though, and the fall of a tower built on something false is, and should be, liberating for most queer seekers. You get to rebuild your life as yourself, on your own terms. Yes, we see heartache and pain and misery. Grieve. Mourn. Cry. Know when it's time to rebuild, and know that rebuilding as your queerest, most authentic self is absolutely your best bet.
