In the Tarot deck Strength is the eighth card. If you take a look at the tree of life. The Qabalah names the eighth spot Hod. This means glory. I could tell you every thing about the card now. The glory and strength of God is love. Your glory and strength is love.

When you look at the deck you see a figure. They hold the mouth of the lion. This lion is our impulses. The conflicting energies from the last few cards. It is our human nature. My aunt use to say tell me how the spirit was willing. But the flesh was weak. The lion is the flesh. It is strong in its weakness. The figure doesn’t hold the lion’s mouth shut.

While we shouldn’t be ruled by our impulses. We do need to respect their voices. They are a part of who we are, a part of God. The messages they give contain lessons. Important lessons if we take the time to listen. But we need to know when to follow these voices. And we to let them go. If we don’t listen to them. If we don’t understand. Then we could either be capricious. Or miss out on the meaning they offer our lives.

The balance is important. We develop strength. Loving ourselves is an example of a hard lesson. It isn’t easy to love each other. And in some ways even harder to love ourselves honestly. An honest self-love doesn’t think we are perfect. It knows we have faults. And it knows where we are weak. But an honest self-love also knows we are children of God. We are expressions of Love. A piece of the glory of God. Only love is real.

There may be no greater strength than honest self-love. Because we so easily slide to arrogance or self-loathing. And to many arrogance may appear to be self-love. But at a real level self-love isn’t arrogant. Because it feels no need to impress. There is no desire to hold influence over other minds.

The figure on the card wears white. It takes a pure heart to love. A pure heart and spirit to wrestle with the lion. The flowers in the figure’s hair and around the waist express a blooming strength. Love is pure goodness or it isn’t love at all. And it is growing all around us. If we open our eyes we will see. If we open our pure hearts we will see.

The figure of infinity hangs in the sky above the figure’s head. Another connection to the number 8. This symbol last seen above the magician shows the source of our power. We have an unlimited supply of love. And love is the only strength. Love is the only power. We tap into the source of all. We connect with the universe and God. All when we choose to love.

Aleister Crowley named this card Lust. When we love our lives we have a lust for living. The word Lust has been betrayed. The most real Lust is Love. When we love our lives deeply. We have a lust to be alive. When we love ourselves and others deeply. There is a lust to connect on a real level. Not just the rubbing together of fleshy bodies. But the touching of souls. When we Love radically we are showing how strong we are in our spirit. We live in a body, but we are not a body. Others live in bodies but are not bodies. Lust for bodies is a weak and shallow lust.

What this card is tell you today is gather your strength. A challenge awaits you in the near future. But you have the tools. And you have the strength to overcome these mountains. Find the source of all Love inside of you. Then you can not lose. The glory of God will take you any where you want to go. The glory of yourself will take you no where. Remember as you move forward to stay focused. Recall the source of your energy. Connect with it often.

This card is telling you: you’ve got this. But it isn’t telling you it will be easy. When in doubt of what the you should do next. Choose to love even more. This card is alerting you to the fact you’ll need this love. Or maybe it is encouraging you to find this love in your current struggles. Love in a radical and free way. Love yourself for making mistakes, and for making growth. Whatever others have done, or do to you. Love them for being broken, hurt and lost souls like yourself. Ongoing abusive behavior has to stop. Because this isn’t love. But walking away is a step of love too.