The 78 Cards
Seven of Cups
Minor Arcana, the suit of Cups, the Seven. Element: water.
Too many dreams, and which one is real.
The picture
A dark figure, seen from behind in shadow, raises a hand towards seven cups floating on a bank of cloud. Each cup holds something different. A curly haired head. A veiled figure glowing with red light. A snake. A castle on a rock. A heap of jewels. A laurel wreath. A small dragon.
Upright
Seven is reflection and reassessment. In Cups, it is the moment the heart is dazzled by options and has to stop and look at them properly.
This is the card of wishful thinking and choices. Every cup is a possibility, and they are all floating on cloud. Some are gifts: the wreath of success, the castle of security. Some are traps: the snake, the dragon, the jewels that might be glass. From where the figure stands, they all look equally shiny.
The Seven of Cups turns up when you are spending more time imagining than choosing. Daydreams of the perfect partner, the perfect job, the move that will fix everything. Dreaming is lovely. The trouble starts when the dreaming replaces the doing.
So take one cup down from the cloud. Put it on the table. Look at what is really in it. Then do one small, practical thing about it, and see whether it still shines in daylight.
Reversed
Reversed, the clouds either thicken or clear away completely. I read this card as too much or too little.
Too much is being lost in the clouds altogether. So many options that none gets chosen, and the dreams become a comfortable place to live. Too little is the opposite trouble: you have stopped dreaming at all, and nothing in the clouds seems worth reaching for.
To tell which, count how many things you are wishing for and how many you are working on. If the list of wishes is long and the list of actions is empty, it is too much. If both lists are empty, it is too little, and the work is to let yourself want something again.
When it turns up
If you had to choose one of your dreams today and put a date on it, which would it be?
If you would like the cards read against your own chart, my readings are here.
Related pages
The Number 7
The 78 Cards
Every card in the deck, upright and reversed.
See every page and post in the Contents.
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