heart shaped world

What we build and imagine to be safe and secure, nature can strike down in an instant. This is an unsettling card which forces us to consider our frailties – health, finances, security all the things that can be compromised turning our lives upside down and inside out.  The relationship we’d believed was forever, the investment that seemed so secure, the trifling rash that turned out to be something more serious ~ The Tower does not mean that any or all of these things are about to happen to us or to someone we care for, but that we should build on foundations as secure as we can make them – to factor in the possibility, to insure against it, to be prepared for a worse-case scenario whenever possible.   ‘Yes’, says the Tower, ‘I see what you have achieved, but have you considered this…?’  And it can relate retrospectively – people often consult the Tarot after the thunderbolt has struck.  The message is, of course, What have you learned?  Finally, in some instances – context and placement is everything – it is possible for the questioner to actually be the disruptive force wielding the thunderbolt. 

    The Tower shows that we can wall ourselves into an area of supposed security that can suddenly start to waver. This is very much a matter of structures and dimensions that have become too small and narrow for us. Convictions and basic principles of life could be affected by this, as well as our thoughts of security in the professional and financial sense. Last but not least, our personal friendships and other partnerships could also be influenced. In every case, the Tower stands for a concept that used to give us a reassuring measure of security, perhaps even a feeling of safety. But now we have grown out of it. These old concepts are usually toppled by surprising experiences, sometimes even true flashes of genius. Since this is a matter of the supposed basis of our security, these sudden changes are often first experienced as catastrophes. It is only when the first shock has been overcome that we sense with relief that we have been freed from old burdens. This breakthrough can be triggered through our own perceptions as well as external events.

The I Ching says in this regard: "The storm with its thunder and lightning overcomes the disturbing tension in nature."