Editor’s Note: If you want to experiment with tarot cards and don’t have any, we provide a free tarot spread generator using the Celtic Wings spread, which is based on the traditional Celtic Cross spread. This article tells you how to use the spread. You can visit Sarah’s website here. –efc
By Sarah Taylor
After the energy of the Threes, which we looked at in November, there comes a little time to rest. Not much, mind. Just enough to stand back and recognise the opportunity to take stock of things. That is because the Fours are really the first pause for thought that we have in the evolution of the cards in each suit, as they run from Ace through to King.
Four is a stable number. Building blocks are typically based on the principle of four. Most tables and chairs have four legs; most cars have four wheels; babies learning to toddle get down on all fours when they need a rest from the precariousness of two strange feet. People who are solid and predictable aren’t called “square” for nothing.
In tarot, Four enables something to come into balance more easily than its predecessors. It is a moment of suspended animation — as if there is a call to gather reserves, because they will be required soon enough as we move on again into the action and increasing complexity of the Fives.
As always, I’m going to go through the cards one at a time, having a look at what speaks out that builds on this idea of ‘taking pause’ and what might perhaps seem to contradict it, and drawing parallels between the different suits when they become apparent.
Four of Wands
At first, this card seems to be about action — and in a way the two figures remind me of the Three of Cups, where three women dance together, their cups raised in the centre. However, on closer inspection, this isn’t really about movement at all… or, rather, not directly.