Ten of Wands 2/8/26

Hello lovely followers! How did the Eight of Cups land with you last week? Did it resonate? I hope it did and that you were able to make use of the energy of the card.

This week we have the Ten of Wands. A card of creation and the struggles to get your creation off the ground. It can also speak to you about taking on a burden that isn’t yours. Either way, this card is about struggle and how to overcome the obstacles in front of us.

The RWS deck shows a man shouldering a burden; a large bundle of sticks that are hard to pick up, but try as he might, he can’t keep going. He drops them and then tries again. He needs to decide what to do about that burden. Is it worth it to hold onto it? Is it his to carry in the first place?

What this card says is that you need to regroup. Take stock of the situation and see what that difficulty is. This is the time to see what the struggle is and what to do about it. So, he needs to ask himself a couple of questions, right off the bat.

Is it that no matter how he tries to pick it up and take it with him, it’s still too heavy? Does he hold it wrong and can’t keep his grip? Or maybe it’s something more hidden. Something that he picked up along the way that he thought he had to do.  Is this really his to carry, or should he hand it back to the person it truly belongs to?

If this is your creation, the thing that you’ve tried to pick up because it stands for something that you want to do, you need to look deeper. Look at what is holding you back. It could be self-doubt, self-sabotage, not enough planning, or lack of clarity; maybe even that dreaded answer “All of the above”. That is painful.

What does that bundle of wands represent to you? Maybe it’s a new idea for work that you know would be great, but you’re a little hesitant to try to put it into motion. It might be an idea for landscaping around your home that seems too ambitious. Or a business idea that’s just sitting in a corner gathering dust because you can’t seem to get it going.

Have you put together a plan? Have you made it crystal clear in your mind where you’re going with it? If not, it’s time to reassess what you’re doing. You might need to actually MAKE a plan. Many times, we think we know what needs to be done, then we find out later the things we didn’t consider. Write down the steps you know you need to take and then brainstorm the things that you don’t know about making it happen. Then, think about what you might not know that you need to know. Often, we don’t know what we don’t know and everything just stalls or blows up in our face.

I’ve run into that with Two Broomsticks, not thinking about the actual execution and ALL the steps that I had to take before I could make it happen. This card is talking to me, too. I need to reassess something I thought would be so easy, and now I’ve found that there are several things I hadn’t even considered that I’d need to know. This is my week to work out the kinks I put in my own way to getting this new side of the business off the ground. A bit of self-sabotage by not considering what I don’t know and lack of clarity about what steps I need to take. Happens to us all.

We also need to consider that maybe it’s not worth the trouble to keep going. It might be that what you are holding onto isn’t what you really want. Maybe we should actually drop the bundle and let the sticks land where they may. We don’t have to keep trying something just because we once wanted to make it happen. People change; circumstances change. What we wanted 10 years ago isn’t the same things we want today. There’s nothing wrong with changing our minds. Keep what serves and let the rest go. You learned something, who knows what that can be used for at a later point.

Another aspect of this card is about the burden you’re carrying that really doesn’t belong to you. This one can be painful but letting go can set you free.

Who is the person that you’re doing something for that really you shouldn’t be? Is it family? A partner? A friend or a co-worker?

If you’ve picked up extra chores for your kid because they are just not getting it done, who is that favor for? Your kid or yourself? If you think you’re helping, maybe you really aren’t. Maybe you’re also giving yourself more stress and making less time to do something that you like to do. Your kid might be happy not to have to do the dishes and knows that if he just makes it look like it’s too much for his plate, you’ll help him out and do it for him. Who’s benefiting? Now, not all kids are manipulative and trying to hand off the things they don’t want to do. Maybe they just hate doing it, so they procrastinate and you eventually just do it, so it’s done. They aren’t manipulating you, it’s just a habit you’ve both gotten into and you’re both keeping it going. Time to end that cycle. He needs to do his chores and take responsibility, and you need to take responsibility for teaching him that some chores aren’t optional and others won’t always be around to do them for him.

Another example is the friend or loved one that you start doing things for because you see them struggling and you naturally want to help them. You might have lent them a shoulder and the venting and weeping keep going, long after they should have picked up their emotions and stopped dropping them in your lap. Short term, that’s what friends and family are for, to be there when things are hard. Long term, they are things they truly need to take back and deal with on their own. You aren’t their finance minister, nor their therapist. A good friend sees that they’re back on their feet and helps them by handing those things back, gently and with love. They can’t grow if they keep putting things in other people's hands. And you’re not helping them by enabling them.

What the Ten of Wands wants us to do is look again. At everything. Look again and see if what you’re carrying is what you truly need to carry or if it’s something that you need to put down. This isn’t quitting, it’s discernment. It’s taking a hard look at things in your path and figuring out what serves and what does not. What is helping you or someone else and what is not? We cannot soar if we allow gravity to pull us down. Carrying a burden that you don’t have to carry only lets gravity take over and keep you from taking flight into the future that you truly want.