The Sevens
Seven is one of the most pervasive and powerful numbers in our culture. In religion, it is strewn all throughout Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and Hinduism, from the Seven Cardinal Virtues (and the Seven Deadly Sins), to the Seven Pillars of the House of Wisdom, the seven walks of the Sa’ee, and the seven worlds of the cosmos. Outside of the major world religions, there are references to the number seven that are important to the religious cultures and spiritual traditions of people all around the world.
And from there, in secular society and in pop culture, the number seven holds an indescribeable appeal: In movies we know of the Seven Samurai, or their American Old West counterparts, the Magnificent Seven. When gambling or playing games of chance, we are always tempted by the allure of betting on lucky number seven.
Seven, as we are taught to believe in pop numerology, is a magical number. But if we look at the Sevens of the tarot, we see a mosaic of themes that don’t seem to fit our ideas of being lucky. We do see though that they all feature individual people entirely on their own (as opposed to being in a group, or depicted with animals or angelic/spiritual creatures), and they all feature people who are actively participating in the scene, frozen in mid-action. We know they are in the middle of doing something because of what’s going with their hands: They are either grabbing something with their hands, using a tool, or their hands are expressively in the air. What’s so magical about that?
In very broad brush strokes, I would argue magic is the belief that through ritual or practice, you can invoke or channel something intangible to modern science to effect intentional change upon the material world. Intentional here is the keyword. It means you acting with intent and the aid of the spiritual world to make the changes you need to do, to get to your goal. Some might know this as the simple act of prayer. Others have described this as the popular “Law of Attraction”; the infamous occultist Aleister Crowley — who like A.E. Waite and Pamela Coleman-Smith was a member of the Golden Dawn — would describe this as imposing your will upon the universe.
In pratical, day to day terms, this means simply having the drive — and I would even personally go so far as to say, the spiritual drive — to take charge of the situation you’re in. To persevere, take control, and assume responsibility for what’s around you.
One additional insight on the number seven in the tarot comes from the venerable (but sadly now closed) community hub Aecletic Tarot, which has this to say on the Sevens:
“As with the Chariot [the seventh card of the Major Arcana], the Sevens require that you take control in a tough situation, manage your responsibilities, and find a way to succeed. One constant is the paradox of the chariot, a card that should be about movement, but is pictured at rest. Likewise, the driver of a chariot never moves. He holds fast to the reins and stands still there in the car. It goes from one point to the other at his command, but he, carried along within, remains steadfast.”
It is more then, than just diving into the action and taking charge. It is being steadfast and determined to see their endeavours through to the end, to their intended goal.
The first example of this is the Seven of Pentacles, which depicts a person resting on their spade, their eyes cast down carefully upon the seven pentacles arranged like fruit growing from the plant rising from the bottom left corner of the card. The plant (which resembles a common bean plant) is one that they have carefully cultivated and raised, and now their hard work has started to at least bear fruit. With all of this bounty just waiting to be collected, the question faced is what to do now: harvest now, or wait to harvest later? With legs relaxed and apart, and feet splayed outward, their figure suggests that waiting is what they will do. No, we will wait to harvest later. The temptation to act now is there, but they have their thoughts clearly fixed on their future goal.
For most people, there are many day to day situations that can connect to the Seven of Pentacles. But for ace and aro people specifically, who have to navigate the world of relationships, romance, and dating in an amatonormative culture, many times even just making new friends or joining new groups can be a frustrating exercise in patience. Like it or not, we have to play the waiting game. On one level, when do we broach the topic of sexual (or gender) identity with new friends, or people to whom we may feel romantically or queer platonically attracted? When do we (or even, can we? Will we?) feel safe enough to out ourselves to a new activity or community group? On another level, the amatonormative nature of society means that even the process of finding suitable friends or friend groups can be an excruciatingly long and drawn out process. It is the wait for just the right person or people to come along, among whom you can finally let your guard down. In a world where most people are more interested in sex and dating, most people are effectively unavailable for socializing, or are so deep into their own relationships such that they’re basically uninterested in other friends. It’s simply so hard to find ace or aro-affirming friends, let alone a romantic or queer platonic partner, who would be accepting and open to an ace or aro person’s identity.
The Seven of Pentacles offers us the promise of patience. While it would be very easy to compromise oneself and one’s own boundaries just for the promise of staving off loneliness, one has to remain steadfast and resolute in what they want in a relationship, and what they expect out of friends and partners alike, as ace and aro people. Eventually the right time will come; your time will come — which is something that I admit sounds like a fool’s mantra — and you will find the companionship and relationships you both need and deserve. Perhaps it may take a shift in mindset after more time taken to work on one’s innerself. Perhaps it may take a shift in setting; a move to a new city or town, or a move to a new social scene in your home area. But it will come. In the meantime, we are cautioned not to waste our valuable time, and energy on people who won’t honor or understnd your asexuaity or aromanticness.
From the Seven of Pentacles we have another illustration of steadfastness: The Seven of Wands.
This card, with the Five of Wands and Six of Wands, almost reminds me again of what happened during Ace Week 2021 in my little corner of social media. Heading into Ace Week this year, the energy was fraught with the voices of both male-presenting, disabled, religious and BIPOC ace people challenging the norms of the ace and aro experience that all too often seem to present a vision of being ace as an experience that is quintessentially white, female, privileged, able-bodied and neurotypical (along with the all too-often erasure of aromantics). At the start of Ace Week itself, the community blossomed with a whole host of voices joining and amplifying ace and aro voices, both in writing and in videos. Several states in the US formally recognized Ace Week. Ace and aro people got more attention as mainstream media outlets gave Ace Week itself more attention. Then, towards the end of the week, the pendulum swung the other way. Ace activist and model Yasmin Benoit encountered the peak of harassment and misogynist, racist outrage against visibility work she’d done with a high end lingerie brand. (Because apparently asexual and aromantic people are not allowed to feel sexy, look sexy or own their sexuality in any way shape or form.) An innocent tweet posted by the Girlguiding (the Girl Guides of the UK) was swiftly met with a tidal wave of aphobia that mixed an unabashed hatred and invalidation of asexuals with hypersensationalized moral panics about sex education, with a healthy dose of Transphobic TERF talking points. This happened again in 2023 with Benoit proudly serving as one of the Grand Marshalls for the parade at NYC Pride, an incredible moment of visibility for queer Black people, and BIPOC aspecs. Her Six of Wands moment — indeed, a Six of Wands moment for all Black aces/aros, and the aspec community as a whole—was quickly followed by an incredible social media backlash of toxicity and misogynoir from aphobes, white supremacists, TERFs and queer exclusionists of all stripes.
So here we are in the Seven of Wands, fresh out of our time in the sun in the Six of Wands. The wands that may have once celebrated our victory with us, are gunning for us, and aimed right at us. Or maybe the angry mob finally found and caught up with us. There’s only one way to respond in a situation like this: fight like hell. And in the case of the backlash to Benoit’s appearance at NYC Pride in 2023, the ace and aro community did just that. The toxicity and anti-aspec hatred galvanized the community, and mobilized many on social media to shine a spotlight on how aspec people face discrimination for their sexuality. It also highlighted how misogynoir continues to rear its ugly head when queerphobia, misogyny and anti-Black racism intersect.
Looking at the figure in this card, it’s clear to me that we are thoroughly unprepared for what’s been thrust upon us. We’re just wearing a tunic over our shirt, with no armour, not even a leather jerkin to protect us. We didn’t even have time to grab proper footwear; on the left leg, we seen an unlaced shoe, while on the other we see a boot. When people are coming at you — whether they be TERFs filling up your DMs on social media, or friends and family launching queerphobic and aphobic attacks against you — you have full license to do what you need to do to protect yourself mentally and emotionally (and physically too!). That could mean muting and blocking people on email or social media. That could mean lauching your own fusilade of posts debunking TERFs, TERF ideology, and aphobic misinformation. It could mean walking away from social media for a badly needed mental health break, or removing ourselves from toxic and unproductive social situations and conversations that are not affirming of asexuality, aromanticism, or queer identities. Or a little “all of the above”. In any and all of those ways, we are staying true to our authentic, honest selves as ace and aro people, and protecting our emotional and mental well-being.
Speaking of removing ourselves from situations, we have the Seven of Swords, which is often given a bit of a bad rap in a lot of tarot discussions I’ve witnessed. This card is often associated with slyly escaping from an awkward situation where we know we’ve done some form of wrongdoing; all too often, the connotation for this card is that we’ve committed some kind of crime, and here we are trying to get away with it. Conniving. Cheating. Dishonesty. Deception. But as seen in so many other cards in the tarot, there are really no such things as “bad” or “good” cards. Just cards that illustrate the realities of life, while inviting us to also ask questions about ourselves and our assumptions. When looking at the Seven of Swords, several questions come to mind: Why is he carrying so many swords away, and why does he look like he is cautiously tiptoing away? And who are the ones in the tents that he is so cautiously slinking away from?
The tents are often attributed to be the tents used by medieval (or at least, pre-gunpowder) armies while on campaign, so the person in this scene is clearly at a numerical disadvantage. He can’t possibly use all five of the swords in his hand to fight, so he’s clearly intending to give them to others to use against the forces he’s fleeing from. (Otherwise, why else would he be taking them?)
So, at least in my eyes, we’re left with a scene of someone faced with a situation of being up against a superior force…and has decided to take charge of this situation. And just maybe, even have a little bit of fun while they’re at it.
For people who work to make life better for ace, aro, and queer people, situations like these are no doubt familiar. Working for ace and aro equity and liberation means having to go up against titanic forces: institutionalized racism, sexism, queerphobia, racism, and of course, capitalism and colonialism, to name a few. It means not just brining a knife to a gun fight, it means bringing a knife to a fight up against the entire United States Army. But we’re not backing down. If anything, we’re going to even up the odds a little — starting with using the tools of oppression against the oppressors.
That means recognizing our privilege, whether it be from religion (e.g. being Christian), being abled bodied or neurotypical, age, gender economically advantaged, or racially advantaged, and using those aspects of our lives to aid and signal boost the voices and lives of black queer people in any and every way that we can, even if involves just throwing a few dollars into the Venmo or CashApp account of a black trans person on Twitter. It means working to give platforms to BIPOC queer people (which can include attending them, and boosting their visibility in your own circles), and giving them the space to speak freely on their experiences, their struggles, and their lives. It means, when in discussions about queerness and the intersectionality it has with other axes of oppression, getting the hell out of the way of people who are racialized and economically marginalized, to let them speak.
It also means being sly and being smart about how you fight your battles. Another person might be tempted to, having grabbed at least one sword, try to run into the tents to kill as many of the soldiers sleeping or off-guard as they can before they get inevitably overwhelemed by the army’s overwhelming force and numbers. They might even run into every tent on the field, frantically trying to find and kill the lead general of the invading force before the alarm is sounded and they are discovered. Another person might try to grab even more swords than they could possibly reasonably carry. None of these options is good in the long run; there is no point in trying to fight when it would end up with you dead. In a practical sense, this means being savvy about how to take on a fight — whether it be against queerphobia or transphobia in one of your offline social spaces, or aphobia on social media, or boosting ace visibility and awareness at the governmental or institutional level. There is little value in taking on a fight that will leave you in an exhausted, burnt out, or otherwise compromised state. It doesn’t do you, or the community any good in the end.
From here we go into the Seven of Cups, which almost serves as a potential warning for what can happen if we are not prepared to fully take charge of our situation. “Choice Paralysis” is the term that comes to mind here. Here, we are confronted with a bewildering array of choices, all magically manifested for us, seemingly to satisfy our needs and wants. But what is it that we really need? What is it that we really want? Many people who are are ace and aro in my experience frequently express a desire for a partnered relationship. But is it really what we want, or is that need for a relationship actually masking or obscuring what is actually a deeper, fundamental need? Perhaps what we really need is companionship or a deeper connection with another human — in that sense, perhaps we might be able to find it in new friendship connections, or with chosen family. Perhaps a feeling of anger, and the opportunity to lash out at someone over an aphobic remark (like in the Seven of Wands) is potentially not an actual opportunity for restorative justice, but is really reflective of a genuine need to feel seen and heard. After our episode of shock and confusion though, we still need to make a choice to go forward. This additionally makes the Seven of Cups a call for us to focus our intentions, root out distractions, and let go of the extraneous things in our lives that we only think we need.
On the flip side of this, it can be a reminder of what can happen if we are prepared to be steadfast and firmly in command of our situation up to this point. If we’ve decided to wait before harvesting in the Seven of Pentacles, we have a glimpse of what is in store for us here: A veritable embarrassment of riches, a huge bounty — whether it be of social, or creative or professional opportunities — that is waiting for us to grab. Perhaps we’ve wanted to pursue writing or other creative endeavours, and have been stuck for ideas on how to channel your experience, emotion, and energy as an ace or aro person into your art. This is the card where the floodgates open. Perhaps we’ve been aching for more friends, social groups and socializing opportunities. This is the card where our social calendar has now become so full that we may need to start actually scaling back our socializing to prioritize more alone time. But as before, it is important to remain steadfast and focused on our goal, whether it be to expand our ace and aro social sphere, to be more creative from our ace and aro experience, or to ultimately be genuine acknowledged in our relationships.
The sevens in the tarot are about magic. But the magic we see here isn’t just about praying and hoping that things will turn out for the best. It’s about making clear our intentions to the universe (or God or Allah, or whatever universal spiritual entity you believe in), and then being committed to that intention becoming a reality. It’s about having the confidence that comes with a trust that somehow, things will work out in a way that serves our true best interests when the right form, direction, and degree of effort is applied; that the imbalances that you may experience in life will be straightened, even if that comes about on a spatial and temporal scale beyond your immediate perception. No matter how contentious your situation may be, a way through is always within our grasp.
