The Empress
The Empress
Number 3 Earth Venus
A major arcana card: the big weather rather than the daily forecast.
Upright
abundancecaregrowththe bodycreating
Something is growing and it needs feeding rather than forcing. The Empress is the card of gardens, pregnancies, projects at the stage where they will come along fine if left alone and watered. She is also unashamedly about the physical (rest, food, comfort, touch) and turns up most often for people who have been treating all of that as optional.
Reversed
depletionsmotheringneglect of selfa stalled creation
The well has run low. Reversed, the Empress is care given until there is none left for yourself, or a creative thing stalled because it is being managed instead of nourished. Occasionally it is the opposite: love that has become control, help nobody asked for.
What is in the picture
She sits on cushions in a field of ripe wheat, a stream running behind her, wearing a crown of stars. Nothing in the picture is being worked at. It is all simply growing.
What it says about…
The line a reading leads with, depending on what you said you were asking about.
A bit of everything
Upright: something is growing. Feed it, do not hurry it.
Reversed: you have given out more than has come in and it is showing.
Love and relationships
Upright: warmth, ease, the physical part of being close to someone. A good card for this.
Reversed: care that has tipped into managing them, or a relationship where you are the only one topping anything up.
Work and direction
Upright: the creative work is going well even if the milestones say otherwise. Let it take its time.
Reversed: you are running on empty and calling it commitment.
Money and security
Upright: enough, and possibly more than enough. Spend some of it on being comfortable.
Reversed: money going out on other people while your own needs queue.
Me, honestly
Upright: be physically kind to yourself this week. Sleep, food, being outdoors. It is not indulgence, it is maintenance.
Reversed: you have been last on your own list long enough that you have stopped noticing.
A decision I am stuck on
Upright: yes, if it grows something. Anything that only extracts is the wrong choice here.
Reversed: not while you are this depleted. Decide when you have slept.
With other cards
With Ten of Pentacles
Growth that lasts. Family, home, a long slow thing that is working. A settled, generous pair with nothing sharp in it.
If this card leads
Feed the thing rather than pulling at it to see if it has grown.
As a yes or no
Upright, it reads as yes. Reversed, maybe.
“I am allowed to be looked after, including by me.”
Draw it in a reading
The meaning above, applied to something you are actually asking about.
