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Originally published on Substack here.

Hello again, hope you’re all hanging in there.

It’s been a wee while since my last post here, through a combination of (1) being overwhelmed and depressed at the state of the world, (2) the constant navigation of life with a chronic illness, and (3) when I actually did try to write on here, honestly it didn’t feel worth putting out into the world. I figure it’s better for me to post here when I feel I have something worthwhile to say.

Something I find so fascinating about the tarot is the connections between the different cards that share the same numbers. These can be likened to similar themes interpreted on the different canvases of each suit, which themselves represent different aspects of our life: wands (fire) are our passions and drive, swords (air) are our thoughts and mind, cups (water) are our feelings and connections, and pentacles (earth) are our body and our existence in the material world.

So I wanted to talk today about the Four cards from each suit of the Tarot and what they can teach us about the different forms that rest can take.

Rest is something I’m always having to navigate and think about in my own life, for a few different reasons:

1. As a disabled person living with chronic illness (Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, or ME/CFS), I need to spend a lot of time resting to avoid or recover from crashes or flare-ups of chronic pain and fatigue.
2. As an autistic person, I can also easily become overwhelmed from things such as sensory input or social interactions.
3. Rest is a central theme in Judaism. Jews mark a day of rest every week (Shabbat or Shabbos), reflecting the creation story in Genesis where G-d creates the world in six days and rests on the seventh. Abraham Joshua Heschel, in The Sabbath (1951), refers to Shabbat as a “palace in time”. The practice of Shabbat can differ depending on the Jewish community and individual; my own practice has varied quite a lot at different points. In addition to this weekly cycle, there are multiyear cycles of rest: every seventh year is the Shmita or sabbatical year. This is a year for the land itself to rest, as “debts are to be forgiven, agricultural lands to lie fallow, private land holdings to become open to the commons, and staples such as food storage and perennial harvests to be freely redistributed and accessible to all“.

But rest, in a multiplicity of forms, is absolutely essential for us all. I hope my exploration of rest through the framing of the tarot can help you think about what kinds of rest you might need more of in your life.

Before I jump in, I’d also just like to note that there is definitely overlap between these different kinds of rest, and that this exploration of rest is simply a starting point.

Without further ado:

The Four of Swords: creating boundaries

Before realising that each of these cards have something to say about rest, this is the card I most associated with rest. In a lot of different decks, it also feels like the card that is most explicitly about rest—for example, in both Thea’s Tarot and the Numinous Tarot, this card depicts someone asleep in bed.

Swords cards relate to the element of air and to our minds—many of them also relate to different aspects of mental health, such as anxiety or overwhelm. The Four of Swords, then, is about rest in the realm of the mind and/or resting your mind—what does this look like for you?

I think it’s really interesting that lots of versions of this card emphasise boundaries, with the four swords often placed like wards around a central figure:

• In the Sasuraibito Tarot it is depicted as someone meditating, with four swords placed around them.
• Thea’s Tarot depicts someone lying in bed, a sword placed on each side of the bed.
• The Fifth Spirit Tarot shows a cicada in the ground surrounded by four swords. (Science nerdery digression: the nymphs, or immature form, of most cicadas remain underground for 13 or 17 years before emerging in their adult form. This spring actually marked the dual emergence of trillions of cicadas from both 13 and 17-year broods in eastern North America! After they emerge, they spend just a few weeks screaming, fucking, and dying.)

What boundaries do you need to create to allow yourself more, or better, mental rest? Some forms this could take include:

• Limiting the time you spend browsing social media or the news, or on your smartphone (this is definitely something I need to work on)
• Working on tasks that don’t require lots of mental energy
• Meditation or quiet time
• Taking a nap

The Four of Pentacles: preserving resources

The next type of rest is represented by the Four of Pentacles. This card is often interpreted as holding on close to things, for example in the sense of being thrifty or frugal with money or possessions. It can also be associated with concepts such as greed, stinginess, or a scarcity mindset. (Stasia Burrington refers to it as the “Gollum card” in the guidebook for her Sasuraibito Tarot—”my precioussss”!)

But while the Pentacles suit is often associated with concepts such money or work, that is such a limiting perspective. More generally, the Pentacles are about our existence in the material world: our bodies, that which sustain us, the things we put our time and energy towards. And in the context of rest, this card reminds us of the importance of preserving our resources, of being mindful of what we actually have the capacity to do.

One framework of thinking about this is through spoon theory. In this metaphor, originating from the disabled and chronic illness community, our mental or physical capacity to do tasks and activities is measured in “spoons”. People with chronic illnesses, such as myself, often start the day with limited energy for everyday tasks, which can quickly be depleted. We thus have to budget our limited energy, and the activities we are able to do, to avoid crashes or other negative symptoms.

If you have a chronic illness or personally identify as a “spoonie”, this likely sounds very familiar. But I think the idea behind this is more widely relevant, even if you’re not. Namely, the importance of rest as a way to preserve our resources, such as energy or capacity. We need to listen to our bodies and know when to say no.

Here’s a few different forms this can take:

• Setting aside time regularly, or as you need to, where you don’t make plans or try to do anything that takes you a lot of energy.
• Finding ways to save work for you later on when you need to rest, such as batch cooking, or fairly dividing chores with your partner or flatmate.
• Asking for help when you need it.
• If you’ve got a lot going on in a day, or week, or month, being able to say no to additional plans that may be too much for the moment.

The Four of Wands: joy and celebration

Wands are associated with the element of fire, and with things such as vitality, passion, creativity. The Four of Wands brings together the stability of the number four with this very energetic suit.

This is a very celebratory and joyous card, and often portrays some sort of celebration, For example, the Rider-Waite-Smith version contains a canopy very reminiscent of a chuppah, the canopy the couple stands under in a Jewish wedding. The Numinous Tarot has a similar sort of canopy (held up by four giant candles!) with a circle of people standing beneath it and dancing.

This card is associated with the home. In the Rider-Waite-Smith, the background of the card portrays a castle; in the Fifth Spirit Tarot, this card depicts a fiery stove, a kettle and frying pan atop it.

In general I would see this as a card about celebration and accomplishments, both big and small—from a wedding or new home, to having a dinner with a friend or two. It’s about celebrating and finding joy and magic in all these moments.

In the context of rest, this card is a reminder to find joy and delight. From a Jewish perspective, I am reminded of how Shabbat is seen as not only a day of rest, but also of delight: “and you will call Shabbat a delight” (Isaiah 58:13). To this end, Shabbat is traditionally spent with friends and family, with a nice dinner (featuring candles, wine or grape juice, and challah) on Friday night, and joyful activities for the next 25 hours (I like reading, playing board games with friends, or going for a walk). Even when I am alone on Shabbat, I try to find joy and leisure in the little things. Shabbat is an opportunity to slow down and enjoy the things you aren’t able to the rest of the week.

Where can you cultivate joy in your times of rest?

The Four of Cups: distraction from emotions

From the joy of the Four of Cups, we turn to a card that is traditionally associated with things such as depression and apathy. The Four of Cups is often associated with being disconnected with the joys in your life or taking them for granted (looking away from cups), or missing new opportunities (it often depicts a cup being offered to a person, which they are oblivious to). There’s also an aspect of turning inwards, contemplation, and—yes—resting, often featuring a seated figure, perhaps with their eyes closed.

What lessons does this card have to offer about rest? In many versions of the card, this card depicts someone looking away from four cups. Cups in the tarot signify emotions, so the person could be looking away from their emotions. The Spacious Tarot portrays a similar meaning in a different way: four cups sitting on a stone in the middle or a fast-flowing stream, out of the way of the current (again, in this case, the current could represent strong emotions).

One way this can be interpreted in the context of rest is trying to distract ourselves from our emotions when they’re too intense. Of course it is important to let ourselves feel our emotions, and we don’t want to be caught up in extended periods of depression or apathy, or the self-absorption that can also be associated with this card, but sometimes things are just really intense and we need a distraction for a little bit.

For me, this distraction can often take the form of escapism: watching a movie or TV show, playing a video game, reading a book, listening to (and sometimes singing along with) music. It could also be going a walk outside or seeing a friend.

For these types of rest, I think the most important thing is to be gentle on yourself, and to listen to your body. What do you need at a given moment? How can you better prioritise and find time for rest in your life?

In our capitalist society, there is so much pressure to overwork and be as “productive” as possible. When we do rest, we can often feel guilty about it. But rest is not a luxury. It is a necessity.