By Sarah Taylor
Air being held by earth. This is the collective quality of the three cards in today’s reading. It describes the idea of something that issues from the mind being grounded by, well, ground — or, more exactly, the grounded nature of your body when you feel its connection to the earth around and beneath it.
Appropriately, Swords are considered the sharpest suit in tarot, seeming to hold a higher-than-average number of cards that are deemed negative. Try to find a ‘positive’ Swords card, and you realise that the pickings are slim. Why is this?
My feeling is that this is because Swords represent thought, which is Mercurial in nature, much like a blade: fast, sharp, and prone to changing direction with nary a second’s notice. Just as quickly as you have a thought, you can turn it on others, and you can turn it on yourself. There’s something to be said about the many schools of thought that encourage us not to identify ourselves fully with the mind: if we aren’t practised at working our sword with skill, dexterity and integrity, we are as a neophyte with a sabre, swinging it mind-lessly (where the mind is not grounded). Ouch, ouch, ouch!
This is where “earth” comes in. When you ground yourself, by moving into your body, experiencing your world through your senses and feeling your connection to the steadiness within, your mind sinks into a calmer state. It quietens; the wisdom behind any redundant movement comes through. The sword becomes a blade that cuts cleanly, paring everything away that doesn’t matter. It is then that you gain insight.