The Tarot card tells you that your life is in balance, page 1/2Symbolism and meaning |
If the World appears in a spread, we can breathe a sigh of relief - we have arrived at our goal and can celebrate a happy end. Everyone who draws this card can be quite happy about it. This card radiates from the first the spirit of perfection, harmony and the promise that your world is in balance. The World is the highest of the twenty-two Trump cards in the Tarot. The Major Arcana starts at zero with The Fool and ends at twenty-one with The World.
SYMBOLISM:
In the Rider-Waite Tarot we see a naked dancing woman encircled by an elliptically shaped laurel wreath. She is accompanied in the four corners by an angel, an eagle, a lion and a bull, which represent the four seasons or four elements — all the parts comprising the whole. Interestingly, unlike the card Wheel of Fortune, these symbols no longer carry a book in the hand. One presumes that, between the stations of The Hanged Man and The World, some lessons of life have been learned.
The laurel wreath is adorned top and bottom with two red bands in the form of a lemniscate (a horizontal figure 8), the symbol for infinity. The specific placement of the bands indicates a healthful mix of opposing themes. The dancing woman represents liveliness, lightness, and joy. The two wands she holds indicate the felicitous balance of male and female energy, between light and shadow, the active and the passive, all the extant polarities. The shape of the laurel wreath is reminiscent of a zero, a reminder that the end and the beginning are one and the same, since the Major Arcana begins with the The Fool — card zero. With The World card, the entire potential that lies hidden in The Fool’s bag is brought to full bloom and completion.
MEANING:
The World is the card of arriving. We have completed a cycle, achieved a goal, and arrived at an important stage — truly found our destiny. We are in the right place at the right time. The World expresses peace, fulfilment, completion, happiness and deep thankfulness for that which we have achieved. You could say that The World is a “happy ending” card. Now we can lay back and enjoy having achieved the goal, before we embark on the next voyage and set new objectives. This is the minor dark side of the card: if we spend too much time gloating over our achievements, no further development is possible. If we visualise life as a spiral, then we consistently travel from The Fool to The World, developing our Self in the process, and ideally preparing ourselves ever better for the challenges which life will offer. The world describes the correct attitude that we should assume, the right place in which we find ourselves, the approach we should take and the stage at which we have developed. It also describes the way we see our world, our “world-view” as such.
In terms of relationships, The World tells us that we have found our correct place in the relationship, and that it is of deep meaning for us. As a portent, this tells us to find the right partner, and not some flash in the pan. The World can also tell us that two people compliment each other well, have a successful relationship, in which both people can find the space that suits them. It could be a relationship that is integral and natural, one in which both people can truly express themselves, and not have to exclude the other from parts of their lives —a relationship that truly flows.
