The Hanged Man

The Hanged Man is regarded as the twelfth card in the Major Arcana of Tarot Cards, which comprises of twenty-two cards in total.

The Story behind The Hanged Man

For nine days The Fool sits under a tree, desperately searching within for his spiritual side. Life goes on around him, but The Fool is oblivious to this. The Fool decides to climb the tree and hang upside down on the ninth day. He empties his mind and ignores the money falling out of his pocket. This causes him to realise that he is looking at everything from a different angle. He must take advantage of this new insight quickly, as it might not last very long. First he just hangs there, admiring the new view.

Meaning of The Hanged Man Tarot Card

The Hanged Man Tarot Card carries some very important lessons. However, they are often not easy to accept. The basic premise of this card is that it is trying to tell someone to move forward and stop dwelling on their past. Dwelling on one’s past is a good way to get stuck in a rut. Although it’s usually not that difficult to tell to someone else, it can be very hard for a person to hear themselves, and even harder to do something about it.

Hanging upside down from a tree is hardly the most comfortable thing that someone can do, but it shows us that sometimes we need to make a sacrifice to gain a new insight. This sacrifice might be tiny in comparison to what insight one can gain. This card also shows us that we sometimes have to embrace the spiritual world and not spend all of our time thinking about the physical one. It’s important to realise that these things often happen on their own, but we must make ourselves open to change.