The four aces from a standard playing card deck.
Photo by Praveen kumar Mathivanan on Unsplash

The Aces

The Invitation

justin
7 min readFeb 5, 2023

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What’s in a name?

The word “asexual” has a very specific meaning for many people who find themselves otherwise alienated from the language and experience of sexual attraction. It gives their identity — our identity — a firm rooting in the language of non-normative sexuality. But queerness, like so many other facets of our collective and individual lived experience, refuses to submit to simple classification. It wasn’t long before some people saw “asexual” as something that both did and didn’t resonate with their sexuality. This gave rise to the wealth of language that we have now that we associate with asexuality and aromanticism. We saw this rising with the concepts of the Asexual and Aromantic Spectrums entering into the asexual lexicon; the fluidity of the terms “ace”, “aro”, and “asexual” became more accepted as people understood them as broader and descriptive umbrella terms, rather than purely prescriptive labels. As I write this at the start of 2023, I see the word “asexual” becoming more inclusive and more reflective of the diversity within the asexual experience. The conversation around asexuality and aromanticism has become more aware of aces and aros with varied lived experiences intersecting with race, disability, and gender. The asexual, aromantic, and queer community as a whole have all benefitted greatly from this. Like the entirety of the tarot itself, “asexual” defies any attempt to pin it down into a neatly defined category, and I see this so powerfully represented in the Ace cards when taken together as a collective set.

Through their descendants in our modern-day playing card deck, the Ace cards in the tarot have a special relevance to asexuals and aromantics that goes to the heart of ace and aro culture and its fondness for emblems and symbols. Going back to 2015, people on the AVEN forums devised a set of correspondences linking various ace and aro identities to each of the four Ace cards:

A table of playing card suits and ace/aro spectrum identities. Spades = Aromantic, Hearts = Romantic, Clubs = Greyromantic (unofficial), Diamonds = Demiromantic (unofficial)
Ace card (playing card deck) suit and ace/aro identity correspondences (‘Silver, AVEN Forums, 9/2/15)
A table of playing card suits and ace/aro spectrum identities. Spades = Aromantic Asexual/Asexuals who have had no romantic attraction; Hearts = Alloromantic Asexual; Clubs = Demisexuals/Demiromantic, Diamonds = Grey asexuals/Greyromantic
Ace card (playing card deck) suit and ace/aro identity correspondences (Spoilmilk, r/Asexuality, 3/28/20)

Translating these to tarot imagery, the Ace of Spades translates to the Ace of Swords, while the Ace of Hearts becomes the Ace of Cups. The Ace of Diamonds is the Ace of Pentacles, and the Ace of Clubs is the Ace of Wands.

I’m not at all opposed to this set of meanings; I feel there is room here for people to move in and out of these associations and identities, as both their sexual and romantic awareness and experience evolves. But I think there’s more to see here than emblems for specific identities: There’s a lesson here for which we are called to be receptive, speaking to the diversity of our asexual and aromantic experience.

The Ace of Swords can show how on a cognitive level, being ace and/or aro can make perfect sense when taking stock of our patterns of attraction and relationships. Perhaps like me, you found yourself alienated at an early age from discussions of who was “hot”, and found yourself only genuinely attracted to people who made you feel genuinely safe, people with whom you found an almost unequalled level of emotionally intimacy and friendship. The Ace of Cups speaks to that same closeness and friendship, a type of connection that transcends conventional and normative ideals of romance or sexual partnership. The Ace of Pentacles reflects on how a better awareness and understanding of our (a)sexual selves has the potential to better ground us in our bodies, helping us on a path of deeper self-acceptance and self-confidence, while the Ace of Wands beckons us to act on our groundedness, our awareness, and our emotional experience to create something that links us to others, be it through community organizing, writing, music, or art.

Taken together, they are a window into how living as ace or aro can look very different for a wide variety of people, while at the same time expressing common threads that can unite them in their experience. They remind us that there is no one canonical way to exist in the world as asexual or aromantic, and our expression of our own individual experiences reinforces the queerness that we all share in common. The appearance of any given Ace in a tarot reading in no way demeans or silences the existence or power of any of the other Aces. On the contrary, if two or more Aces appear in a spread, they only serve to amplify and reinforce the messages they are delivering: If the Ace of Swords and the Ace of Cups appear together, they add to each other’s meaning, add additional layers of information that may not have been apparent had they appeared seperately: Together, they are far, far more than the sum of their parts.

I think there is something valuable to be learned from that.

They can also be seen as a virtuous circle, a cycle of creation, connection, self-love and understanding that can further unite us. There is a real urgency in our need to stand united as a community: As queer people, we live amidst a world more and more fractured, obsessed over what should tear us apart, instead of lifting up that which can mend us together.

For all four of the suits of the tarot, a hand seemingly out of the heavens offers the each suit’s respective symbol, as if in offering to us. Whether it be with an emotional connection, an insight into a situation or idea, a money or career-related opportunity, or some powerful creative fire, we are given something new which we can possibly use to change what’s happening in our life — hopefully for the better.

On one level, the Aces are usually seen to herald the coming of a new opportunity or new connection in the realms of their respective suits. Hence, the Ace of Pentacles would be a really nice card to have when interviewing for a new job, while the Ace of Cups would be a most welcome card if you were seriously thinking about joining up with a local queer or ace/aro community group.

On another level however, the Aces are also seen as entreaties, for those who find themselves stuck, or even in retrograde motion. Have you spent a significant time living on your own, or living inside your own head? Maybe it’s long since past the time you’d have to take a sword and slice away all of the things (namely, situations, people, ideas or things) filling your head with brain fog. Are you curious about the lack of progress in your efforts to find an validating friendship, or an affirming relationship? Perhaps what you need to do for now is double down on your work and career until you’ve gained a solid enough grounding in your life to put energy into seeking a queerplatonic or ace/aro-positive partner. Perhaps you feel stuck with your finances: The answer might be for you to both nourish and pay closer attention to the many relationships in your life…after all, who knows what career or job prospects may be open and available to you, simply because of your social or family network. If you’re facing up against a massive case of writer’s block (or whatever equivalent metaphorical barrier exists for other artists and creators), then you may have to strike a massive match to get your creative energies lit up once again (and it very likely may involve you burning something in the process).

Regardless of the sphere of your life in which you finally decide to start working, the most important thing is simply that you’ve decided: you’ve actually chosen to get something in your life finally in motion. All too often there are things we see in the world that we want to do because there is an urgent need for them: perhaps a new podcast about your experiences as queer and asexual. Or perhaps that new book idea that’s been screaming for attention for so long, where you’ve resolved to provide more queer and ace representation in a creative sphere that’s seen little to no positive portrayals of queer or ace people. Maybe you’re thinking of restarting a blog series or making YouTube videos that speak to the asexual or aromantic experience in a way that hasn’t been truly done before. Maybe you’re thinking of putting together a new offline or online safe space for asexuals and aromantics in your area. For many people — especially including myself — the key challenge isn’t even doing the work that needs to be done, whether it’s processing trauma from past relationships, or having an important, difficult conversation about your sexual needs and romantic boundaries with your partner (or partners). The key challenge is just getting started. All journeys really do start with a single step. Congratulations on making your first move.

Previous: Introduction — The Minor Arcana

Next: The Twos — On the Duality of Our Thoughts and Emotions

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justin
justin

Written by justin

Perpetually Caffeinated. Biromantic Demisexual. Still trying to figure stuff out. https://linktr.ee/rampancy

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