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The Empress Tarot Card Meaning: Upright and Reversed Meanings & Breakdowns

Bycat

The Empress Tarot Card Keywords

Upright Keywords

Nurturing, Fertility, Abundance, Divine Feminine, Self Expression, Mothering

Jump to upright meanings

Reversed Keywords

Disease, Overbearing, Dependence, Creative Blocks, Untamed Creativity

Jump to reversed meanings

The Empress Tarot Meaning

The Empress tarot card is known as the ‘mother’ of the tarot deck. She is the one that nurtures and takes care of the material world, so that it can grow and thrive. On traditional tarot illustrations such as that on the Rider Waite-Smith deck, we see a glimpse of the abundance that comes from this nurturing energy, with crops, lush forests and roaring rivers surrounding The Empress. 

I see The Empress and The High Priestess as two sides of the same coin. Both are nurturers and support organic growth, but The High Priestess does this in the ‘underworld’, she takes care of the nurturing in the subconscious and the unconscious parts of the self. The Empress however, deals with the conscious and higher consciousness. Your goals, desires and ambitions? The Empress is the one watering those and helping them to thrive. 

The Empress Upright Meaning

The Empress embodies divine feminine energy. She is a card that is all about taking care of the material world, referring to things like your physical body, conscious mind and goals, home, finances, work, creative output and relationships. When referring to Jungian archetypes, The Empress takes on the role of the mother, a figure we come across in our lives when we experience being nurtured, taken care of, loved and when we offer those to others, acting with compassion and empathy. 

When upright, The Empress is at the forefront of growth. She is the one ensuring everything is in place and working in a healthy and balanced way, to ensure success but not at the cost of health or happiness. 

 The Empress can also represent the Anima, the feminine aspect of a male’s psyche in Jungian psychology. This energy refers to the ability to feel emotional connection with others, intuition, nurturing and ability to have compassion for both the self and others. 

When the upright Empress makes an appearance in your readings, you can approach it in two ways. You can either step into the energy of The Empress, projecting her characteristics onto others or onto the self. Or, you can look for The Empress in the external world. She might appear as opportunities to take time for yourself to relax and destress, she may present herself to remind you to stay open and connected with loved ones or to put yourself first in a situation.

Journal Prompts for The Empress, Upright

How could I prioritise my physical health right now and ensure my mind and body are balanced? 

When was the last time I felt truly connected with myself and the world around me and how could I include more of that into my daily life?

Why might I need the emotional support of others right now and what difference will it make to my well-being?

“The Mother, figuratively, is no less than the source of all life. She represents the love and nurture humans need from day one.” – WhereWonderWaits

The Empress Upright Meanings | Love, Career & Finances

In a Love reading, The Empress shows the importance of being open to love and emotional connection and having a partner who can do the same. For those in a relationship, The Empress can be a great sign of a loving and fertile relationship, or, depending on the context of the reading and the other cards present, a need for more of this energy in the relationship.

The Empress for singles can be a sign to continue to put their needs first and only leap when it feels right for them. Create a life you already love, and the right person will come along who will not only support that life but offer you even more of what you already have. It can also be a sign to know your worth. Do not undervalue what you bring to the table and don’t diminish your own light in order to make room for someone else.

In a career reading, The Empress upright can refer to a role that requires you to manage others and take care of them and their career progression, or a need to do that for yourself. It can symbolise work that requires a lot of compassion and/or empathy for others, such as working with children or within the care sector.

The Empress can also bring your awareness to issues such as burnout or putting the needs of your company before your own, so it’s important to take the context of the reading into consideration when interpreting the card in this way. Always ensure you have a work-life balance that suits you, and don’t be afraid to stand up for what you need.

The Empress upright when appearing in a financial reading can refer to abundance and enjoying the financial security you have, while also nurturing the income and outgoings you have. The Empress isn’t about frivolity; it spends only what it needs to in order to maintain a comfortable life, and treats money as an energetic exchange. It has a great deal of respect for money and so can symbolise a need for sensible budgeting.

This card can also suggest putting money aside, such as in a high-interest account or long-term savings account. It can refer to making long-term investments that will help your finances grow little by little, but it requires patience as it will not be something that happens overnight.

The Empress upright and read as a card of self-development directs your focus to areas such as self-love, focusing on self-care. It shows an ability to nurture and look after yourself so that you feel happy, healthy and thriving. We have to become the mother to ourselves and make sure we have everything we need to live in the best way possible.

This can also be a suggestion to put your time and energy into things you want to improve or achievements you’d like to reach. It’s about planting the seed of an idea so that you can spend time nurturing it and watching it grow. Think about what you want to create for yourself, what do you want your environment to look and feel like and how might that support you moving forward?

The Empress Reversed Meaning

The Empress tarot card reversed turns the nurturing nature of the card on its head. There are two main ways reversals can be read: as internal energies and as opposites to their upright counterparts. 

As an internal energy, The Empress reversed turns all that nurturing, loving and fertile energy inwards. This means focusing on self-worth, self-esteem, self-love and taking care of your body from the inside out. 

As opposites of its upright meanings, The Empress in reverse can indicate a problem with emotional connection to others or allowing emotions to flow as easily as they should.

It can also refer to ‘the mother wound’, a term coined by psychologist Bethany Webster in 2014. This refers to the psychological pain passed down through generations of women, rooted in patriarchal cultures. It encompasses personal, cultural, spiritual, and intergenerational trauma.

When The Empress in reverse appears in your tarot readings, it’s a good idea to look at emotional blocks that could be causing issues such as limiting beliefs, dysfunctional coping mechanisms or emotional struggles. It’s always a great point to take a pause and review the care and love you are showing to yourself and those close to you.

Journal Prompts for The Empress, Reversed

How do I communicate my emotions and well-being to those I love, and how could I improve?

What routines could I create to take better care of my mind and body?

What beliefs about myself and my worth are no longer serving me and how could I rewrite them?

“The anima [feminine energy] is a factor of the utmost importance in the psychology of a man wherever emotions and affects are at work.” – Carl Jung

The Empress Reversed Meanings | Love, Career & Finances

In a love reading, The Empress in reverse could indicate an imbalance between you and your partner, wherein you give them more than they give you or vice versa. The relationship may not be working to its highest potential, and so it’s time to restructure and rethink what needs to change to make positive shifts. Remember, though, it’s not up to you alone to make a relationship work; effort needs to be made on all sides.

For singles, The Empress in reverse can indicate overprotection of the self, keeping your emotions closed off in fear of being hurt. It can also suggest a fierce independance and a desire to protect the life you’ve already built for yourself. This can make it difficult to create space for someone new to come in and slot into this life you have.

In a career reading, The Empress in reverse can suggest that a job is draining you or simply not giving you what you need in order to grow and thrive. The Empress indicates a need to look inwards to find out what it is you need from your role and be open about asking or working for it.

The Empress in reverse can also suggest that you are reluctant to speak up when something doesn’t feel right. It might be that your job no longer gives you what it did, and therefore, you may be ready to move on. The first step in figuring out if your work is working for you is to be honest with yourself and reflect on what you want your daily work life to look and feel like.

The Empress reversed in a financial tarot reading could suggest a lack of respect for financial abundance. Maybe you spend the money as fast as you make it, maybe you hold onto it too tightly and don’t enjoy what the money allows you the opportunities to experience.

The Empress reminds us that we all have a relationship to money and that relationship always needs care and attention to stay healthy and thriving. Maybe you’ve made bad investments in the past, but you can either allow those to ruin your money mindset, or you can learn from them and move forward wiser and more equipped to deal with your own finances.

The Empress reversed can suggest that there is an inner disconnect between your conscious, everyday mind and the subconscious beliefs about the self. Instead of taking care of your spiritual, physical and emotional wellbeing, you may be in need of spending some time just being with yourself, learning what you need and tending to that need, in order to feel ‘unstuck’ or replenish self-love.

You may find yourself out of touch with the things that light you up and bring you joy. You may not know what it is you need anymore or what it is you want to build for yourself. Start every day by asking yourself how you can make the day the best day yet, and whatever your answer is, use it to determine what you might want every day to look and feel like.

The Jungian Mother archetype

Within the flow of The Fool’s Journey, The Empress is the first time we fully become ‘conscious’. Before this, we have been preoccupied in the realm of soul and spirit, yet to be made whole. The Empress is where we are birthed into the world and learn for the first time what it means to be a part of something bigger. 

“The mother archetype is the most significant of all, for this is the archetype of which we first become conscious.” – Carl Jung

The Empress | Esoteric Correspondences

Astrological Sign

The Empress Tarot Meanings Venus

Venus

Venus is the planet of love, named after the Roman goddess of love and beauty. Just like Venus, The Empress is filled with romance, fertility and abundance. It is the nurturer of our external and physical selves and helps us to create a life we feel empowered and supported by.

Elemental Energy

Pentacles Meanings Earth

Elemental Earth

The Empress tarot card corresponds with the elemental energy of earth. It is a card, as I’ve mentioned previously, which is all about fertility and assisting growth. It forms the foundations of what we want to experience and how we want to experience it.

Numerology

Number Three Numerology Meanings

Number Three

The Empress is third in the structure of the Major Arcana. The number three represents the idea of expansion and growth, both properties that we find in The Empress. In this card, we are stretching our roots, seeing where we want to move to and feel confident to take up more space.

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