3 of Swords

Keywords & phrases

Heart ache
Love lost
Trauma past & present
Feeling triggered
Understanding and growth through pain and loss
Compassion for the suffering of others
Empathy
Sensitivity

Keywords & phrases

Heart ache
Love lost
Trauma past & present
Feeling triggered
Understanding and growth through pain and loss
Compassion for the suffering of others
Empathy
Sensitivity

First impressions

Ouch. Drama. And yes, dark skies, stormy weather and real pain.

What is happening in the card?

A tender, naked heart run through, not once, but three times by a trio of long, sharp blades. Storm clouds gather. It’s not just raining, it’s pouring.

Will it ever stop?

This card is so consistently portrayed as the bleeding heart across so many decks. In some there is a glimpse of the light that breaks through the clouds after a storm, offering a glimmer of hope for the broken hearted.

How can we relate to this card?

Well, I think we’ve all been here.

This is the card of heartache and pain. Something that we can relate to from the first teenage break-up, when tender hearts are shocked by how they can become so easily and violently ripped, to more recent woundings, when as adults we wonder how many times we will submit ourselves, open our hearts and make ourselves vulnerable to the seemingly indiscriminate insults and injuries that life throws at us.

The meaning of this card can range from a little oversensitivity in some to the sharpest, most emergent pain in others. Not to be trivialised.

Elements, numbers, symbols & imagery

Element of Air 🜁 the realm of thoughts, words, patterns of thinking and behaviour
The number 3 – creativity, harmony, understanding
The heart as symbolic centre for human emotions
The Bleeding Heart – a symbol of true love mourned and compassion for the suffering of others
The Sacred Heart – Catholic symbol of Christ’s love and sacrifice for humanity on the cross

Emotions expressed

Pain
Grief
Loss
Vulnerability
Compassion
Empathy

Other associations

Tree of life:
3rd Sephira of Binah – understanding – in the realm of Yetzirah – the world of formation, the psyche, conscious and subconscious awareness, thought and action.

Thoth:
Sorrow, Saturn in Libra

Message & affirmations

Today, I hold on to love and choose healing and happiness for myself. I am grateful for my experience of this and every day.

“There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition, and of unspeakable love.”

~ Washington Irving

“If you focus on the hurt you will continue to suffer. If you focus on the lesson You will continue to grow.”

~ John McGrath

“Forgive yourself for not knowing what you didn’t know before you learned it.”

~ Maya Angleou

“The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.”

~ Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

” Be kind and patient and gentle and merciful with one another. Stay close. Hold firm. Forgive. Grief prepares the way. Joy will in time find you. It is searching for you, in the impossible darkness, even now.“

~ Nick Cave, The Red Hand Files

My personal experiences of this card

This card used to scare me as a teenager (with next to no experience of real loss and pain, fortunately) because honestly what could be worse than impending heartache?

Now, older and wiser and many heartbreaks down the road, I understand that wounds heal and that scars can be beautiful. Healing makes you stronger.

Experiencing loss, pain and separation is unavoidable in this life, but what we learn is how to carry on and how to hold others when their hearts are breaking. This is understanding and empathy and it makes us human and whole.

~

There are places I’ll remember
All my life though some have changed
Some forever, not for better
Some have gone and some remain

All these places have their moments
With lovers and friends I still can recall
Some are dead and some are living
In my life I’ve loved them all

But of all these friends and lovers
There is no one compares with you
And these memories lose their meaning
When I think of love as something new

Though I know I’ll never lose affection
For people and things that went before
I know I’ll often stop and think about them
In my life I love you more

~

~ In My Life, The Beatles

Events, situations & readings

In a relationship spread:
The 3 of Swords in a reading about relationships reflects a painful situation. Traditional meanings include separation, betrayal and heartache.

In a health and wellbeing spread:
A suggestion that you may need to give yourself a little space and time for healing.

In a personal/spiritual development spread:
Disappointment and pain leading to personal growth.

People & interaction with other cards

There are a number of so-called ‘negative’ or challenging cards in the deck that would amplify the painful significance of the 3 of Swords:

The 5 of Cups, the 5, 7, 9 and 10 of Swords, and, of course, transformative majors like The Tower and Death Cards. In all of these, there is offered the opportunity to heal and grow.

This is also true when the 3 of Swords appears with the ‘lighter’ energies of the Tarot. Such healing cards include:

The Star, Temperance, and the 4 and 6 of Swords.

Questions, prompts & insights

Where is your pain? What events and past wounds do you need to heal from?

What can you do to promote that healing process?

Who around you is in pain? How is that manifesting and what can you do to assist their healing?

Looking back, what painful learning experiences of the past can you be grateful for? How have they made/changed/transformed you?

Featured decks:
Main image from The Rider Waite Tarot.

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Explore the Tarot deck with me

This is a work in progress, a project far from complete. I’m exploring traditional and personal meanings for the Tarot cards in a semi-orderly fashion. Please take a look by clicking on the cards below. Or you can pick a card to see what comes up for you today.