I recently received an email from a reader who asked, “What’s the unluckiest Tarot card?” I had to scratch my head about that one because the whole concept of good luck versus bad luck can get pretty complex. Nonetheless, there are some Tarot cards that can always be considered harbingers of bad luck
THE WHEEL OF FORTUNE, REVERSED
The Wheel of Fortune, Reversed, is the most obvious choice for a, “bad luck,” card. We actually talk about luck in terms of good fortune and bad fortune and that’s what this card is all about. It depicts life as a wheel, where sometimes our luck is ascending and expanding and sometimes it’s descending and decreasing. When The Wheel of Fortune, Reversed, shows up in a reading it indicates that we’re in for a patch of bad luck.
The Kybalion, which is a book about Hermetic Magic, compared it to the pendulum of a clock. The pendulum swings first in one direction and then back in the other. Life can be seen in much the same way: sometimes we’re swinging into really good luck and then we swing back into a period of bad luck.
The obvious underlying message is to just hang on, because things will inevitably change. When we can stand back and look at good luck/bad luck as a rhythmic cycle, then periods of ill fortune will affect us much less severely. We just need to stay centered and calm and wait for the cycle to reverse itself.
THE TOWER
Also known as, “the lightning struck tower,” and, “the blasted tower,” The Tower would probably be my pick as THE unluckiest card in the deck.
At it’s most severe level, it can indicate that everything that you’ve loved and invested in is about to be blasted right down to the ground. The last time that I had it showing up in my personal readings, my life partner died, I lost my house, and I was involved in a horrible law suit over the probate of the estate. It can be that bad, depending on the other cards in the reading, but it usually isn’t.
On a mundane level, The Tower is usually just a powerful warning that we’ve gone down the wrong path and the Universe is about to provide a course correction. Perhaps we’ve been treating our fellow employees badly and – Shazam – we’re suddenly fired or demoted. Or perhaps we’ve been emotionally abusive or neglectful of our lover and they leave us for someone else.
In my experience, there’s always a level of hubris involved with this card. We’re not only taking things for granted, but we’re also being arrogant. We’re assuming that everything is under our control and the Universe is going to show us that we’re not.
The most positive message in this card – which we usually fail to appreciate at the time – is that we get to completely start over. It’s like that line from, Me and Bobby McGee: “Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose.” When our lives (or our projects or relationships, etc.) have been blasted right down to the foundations, we have the freedom to consciously design something new and better.
DEATH
Even if it isn’t the unluckiest card in the deck, Death definitely wins the award for the creepiest card in the Tarot. In her wonderful book, “Fortune Telling by Tarot Cards,” Sasha Fenton puts it in this perfectly understated, British way: “This card usually puts the wind up people when it appears . . .”
Yes.
Now, first of all, I have never seen the Death card appear before someone’s death. It will pop up after someone has died, but it’s usually just a comment on what’s happened. It’s more like, “Well, you’ve lost someone you loved, so you’re dealing with death and grief.”
What it can indicate, though, is that there’s going to be a radical, life changing turn in events in a person’s life. The querent is suddenly going to find herself going in a completely different direction than she has in the past. In an emotional and spiritual sense, it really is as if their previous life has died and they’re off in a completely new direction.
I knew a woman who had been happily married for 15 years, had a home, a loving husband, and 2 kids. She woke up one morning with this thought ringing in her head: “Shit, I’m not in love with him anymore and I hate my life.” Within six months she’d obtained a divorce, turned custody of her children over to her ex-husband and was working as a river guide in West Texas. That’s the kind of radical change that we’re talking about here.
Whether that kind of change is good luck or bad luck is just a matter of interpretation. If it’s something that we consciously plan, we usually view it as good fortune. If it was something that was forced on us by circumstance, we may think it was bad fortune.
JUSTICE, REVERSED
I’m a little hesitant to include the Justice card in this list because it has more to do with people and circumstances than luck per se. Nonetheless, it’s frequently seen as bad luck so I’ll stick it in here.
Classically, as you might guess from the image, Justice has to do with the legal system. If we’re involved in some sort of litigation and Justice is upright, it can mean that we’ll prevail. If it’s reversed, it can mean that we’ll lose.
On a personal level, it can mean that the people around you – your family, co-workers, boss, etc. – are making judgements about you and they’re not good if the card is reversed.
Losing a court case can obviously be seen as bad luck. Or it can be seen as a sign that we have a bad case, a bad lawyer, or a bad judge. In the same way, having people we care about judging us harshly can be seen as being treated unfairly. Or it might be that we’re being jerks and we need to clean up our acts.
Justice, Reversed, can be a sign of a bad luck to come, but it also serves as a warning. It’s saying, “You’re about to have some bad luck, so you need to take a careful look at your own actions before that happens.”
TEN OF SWORDS
It doesn’t take but a glance at the Ten of Swords to realize that there’s some serious bad ju-ju happening here. If we’re lying face down stuck full of swords like a human pin cushion, something’s a little wrong. This card can indicate treachery, deceit or a very, very bad ending to a relationship or a job.
The suit of Swords symbolizes our personal power. That’s the way that we project ourselves out into the world. There’s nothing innately wrong with that. Whether it’s standing up to a school yard bully when we were kids or pushing hard for a project we really believe in at work, there are always times when we have to be a bit aggressive.
But . . . when we’re overly and chronically aggressive, that puts us into a power cycle. We’re trying to dominate other people and run over their emotions and desires. We become the school yard bully instead of the person standing up to the bully. We see this mentality frequently with primitive men who brag about being the, “alpha dog.” It’s dominance for the sake of dominance, rather than for the sake of getting anything done.
The message of this card is the old cliche’: live by the sword, die by the sword. If we’ve been treating other people harshly, if we’ve been abusive in our love relationships, or domineering in work relationships, we’ve got some bad karma heading our way.
So those are the top five, “bad luck,” cards in the Tarot deck. There are, of course, other cards that may indicate bad fortune in one aspect or another of our lives, but these are the red flags. And, of course, we should always remember that a Tarot reading is just a snap shot in time. It tells us what’s likely to happen, but we have the free will to change it.
Just the Tarot 