The Tower – Linestrider Tarot Deck

By TarotX Last updated Nov 6, 2023

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Keyword by The Tower Linestrider

Disruption, displacement, change, liberation, intervention, drama, pride, disaster.

II. Meaning of The Tower Linestrider

The Tower Linestrider is a powerful card, a beacon of great change, riot, and even destruction. Along with that destruction is constructivism. The change will bring new opportunities. The Tower represents truth and honesty, shocking or unpleasant revelations, or incidents that will rock to the very foundation of your belief system or daily routine.

It often describes a major change, shift, or breakdown and development opportunity that follows. In terms of images, the card Tower depicts a tall tower on a mountain. The Tower itself represents structures built on the soft or bogus ground. This tower is drawn in Japanese architecture, which is an image that has stuck in the author’s mind from Akira Kurosawa’s wonderful film, especially his war legends depicting major changes and Great battles between empires.

The Tower Linestrider’s collapse represents immediate change and the effects of that change. Lightning fell and people were falling or jumping out of the tower in despair. Lightning represents an unexpected truth, a revelation that has changed the way you see and understand things in your life. Humans falling makes us think of the people in the Devil card. They fell with their heads down, straight into new minds. Gray clouds represent bad luck, covering everyone without distinction. Mars is the planet that rules this card.

In the reversed position, the Tower Linestrider shows change, riot, discovery and destruction, and growth and rebirth will follow. The Tower is one of the most powerful cards you can draw in a spread.

Some Tarot interpreters believe that the Tower’s position in the spread is of the least importance compared to most other cards because its energy is strong enough to influence the present no matter where it is located. The main thing to understand about the Tower is that it is about great turmoil, changes in life, drastic discoveries, losses, achievements, death, proliferation – these are the important things to change the course of your life.

Overall, there is no way to stop the strong tide of this powerful card but you can activate the early warning system and do your best for the road ahead.

III. The Tower Linestrider in a Tarot spread

“Failure is delay, but not defeat. It is a temporary detour, not a dead-end street” – William Arthur Ward.

When the Tower Linestrider appears, carefully examine the other cards in the spread. Are you facing some obstacles? There could be some big turmoil in your finances. If the Cups cards dominate the spread, count on your close connections to deal with potential changes to come. The Tower will often emphasize cards with impulsive energy.

For instance, the Two of Swords often urges you to open your eyes to see the reality of a situation. When combined with the Tower, this card can carry a powerful reminder – perhaps you are completely blind or dismissing some aspect of your life leading to a rushed landing. Usually, it won’t be time to stop the action, but at least you can press the pop button if there is a time.

For many people, the Tower is inherently a negative card, as it shows that your comfortable life will soon be turned upside down. But it is not the worst, it is not only predictable changes but also changes that come from the impulse of external resources, changes that you rarely control. For some, it was definitely a nightmare. Consider whether you may be rejecting a necessary change, refusing to deal with any pain, anxiety, or humiliation that you know is necessary for you to move forward on your journey.

Even in the reversed position, the Tower Linestrider carries an important message: don’t deny the changes your life needs. Certainly, it will be difficult and painful, but you need to overcome it in order to grow up and become the best version of who you are.

In terms of work, the Tower Linestrider is not a good omen. If you are looking to start a business, you should be careful about possible problems that you did not anticipate. If you are working, this is the time you need to stay calm with everything. Because being hasty, foolhardy, or angry only makes your situation worse. If you want to start a new project, this is not the right time, your plan may be delayed, or at worst, you fail due to external factors you cannot control.

In terms of finance, this will be a difficult time for you. If you are in need, in the coming time there will be some changes for the worse. You should be prepared. If your financial resources are in abundance, then you should consider big changes such as investing in a new field and plan to deal with potentially bad situations.

Because Tower Linestrider represents the destruction once the old has reached its peak so that the new can begin. If you are at the peak of your career as well as the capital, the card warns you to take into account contingency plans or prepare yourself for the old achievement to be completely destroyed, because the old is slowly becoming a prison to wear down your being. If you want to borrow or lend to someone else, this is not the right time, the card reminds you to consider troubling situations before making your final decision.

On matters of friends and associates, the card advises you to try to stay calm during debates with your friends. Because self-expression, as well as anger, can lead to quarrels which make things worse and at the same time can cause a relationship to collapse. Regarding colleagues, conflicts and disagreements between you and them should be resolved frankly, avoid leading to the case of willing speech but unwilling heart. If in the case you are at fault, you should honestly admit your mistakes, and in the opposite case, you should be tolerant to a certain extent because they are the people you work with. If your attitude is too rigid, it will be difficult to cooperate with others.

Regarding family and relatives, the Tower Linestrider signals the argument in your family is influenced by external factors. These are disputes about inheritance, business, and financial intentions. The card advises you that in life, the controversy about interests as well as disagreements is inevitable, the important thing is handling them fairly so that family members still sympathize with each other. You need to beware of external factors influencing, provoking, or detracting your family from getting along. Because arguing in the family is an internal matter, the involvement of outsiders can cause the feelings between your beloved ones to break down.

IV. Message of The Tower Linestrider

Like The Devil Linestrider, this card has many great meanings, and the interpretations of most Tarot handbooks favor superficial moral lessons. The Tower is considered a materialistic conception of the universe, and the destructive lightning that comes to life is based entirely on materialistic principles. Even at this stage, we see very subtle mysteries. At first glance, it seems like an external force falls on the head of a shallow person, but in fact, the violence shown in the card is born of psychological principles. Those who live just to satisfy the ego’s demands for fame, fortune, and physical bliss, ignoring the conscience and spiritual beauty of the universe end up building a prison to surround themselves.

This “bombardment” can arise from external disasters; Your friends and family turn their backs on you, business breaks down, and violence of one kind or another is just hovering around you. And the truth of life – although unbelievable – is that bad luck often comes in swarms. However, how many parts of these ill-treating problems at the moment we are most ragged are the result of long and uneasy situations? And if problems, illness, or death happen to our loved ones, economic problems in social life, or even natural disasters like storms – or lightning strikes – appearing concurrently with personal problems, that kind of “accident” does not make it clear that life really contains more than tangible things.

The story of a series of catastrophes or an emotional phase dominated by violence destroys a strong personality that happens very often. The point here is: if it doesn’t pave the way for the Unconscious to be released, it will swirl around us all the time, and we can take advantage of this experience to find a firmer balance. Some Tarot decks named this card “House of the Devil”; but others named it the “House of the Lord”, reminding us that it is the spiritual force that destroys our psychological prison.

In the 15th card, we find that human beings seeking unity with life must radiate an energy that is always suppressed by personality perception. However, by embracing the Devil, we put the calm and balance of Temperance in danger. We put psychology in the flow of violence that could lead to the explosion of the Tower. Jung described Consciousness as the grave of a dam blocking the free flow of the Conscious River. Temperance plays a role as a type of sluice gate, regulating the flow of water with the correct intensity. The Tower blew up the dam, causing the locked energy source to flow like a flash flood.

But why choose such a dangerous path? The answer is that no mode of existence can go beyond the stronghold of Consciousness, or can break the “thing” that separates life into opposites parting us from the pure primordial energy in our ego. If the veil in the temple is the Consciousness of personality, it protects us from life itself. Like the mystics, magicians, and practitioners have attested, infinite is all around us, invisible and overwhelming. An unprepared mind cannot absorb that energy, and so Consciousness plays the role of a hero that saves the beauty, closing the majority of spiritual energies, breaking experiences down into contradictory items and timing.

The image of a destroyed tower is reminiscent of the Babel Tower. The story of the Tower of Babel in the Bible tells about the diverse origins of human languages, but morally it teaches not to have faith in human abilities (the Tower is materialism). But we can also see another significance in the destruction of the Tower of Babel. The lightning that falls is the word of God that directly reaches humankind, not indirectly through phenomena in the material world.

In some ways the Tower Linestrider is the most complicated card of the Major Arcana; Implications are often not as obvious as superficial ideas. Like the Devil card, its meaning was born out of transparency. It often refers to a period of intense volatility (mental or physiological), sustained destruction of a situation, a breakdown in anger (even violence) of a relationship.

Since the card contains such powerful meanings, many people startled when seeing it. This response raises the crucial question: how to properly appreciate the Tarot’s terrifying images? We must learn to make use of all experiences, the Tower as well as The Lovers. When the Tower Linestrider appears, it is essential to remember that it leads to freedom; The explosion clears up several situations that have emerged from unbearable pressure. It can lead to new beginnings.

To say that the Tower’s presence often means a difficult experience does not mean that deeper meaning will not emerge. The card can also refer to flashy enlightenment, especially if that enlightenment replaces the limited vision of life. Only the reader’s intuition and experience, as well as the implications of the other cards, can point to specific meanings.

The reversed Tower Linestrider refers to the meanings that are molded from the upright card. Violence and storms are still there, but a little lighter. At the same time, the reversed card adds to the meaning of “imprisonment”, as Waite called it. This paradox is resolved when we consider the upright Tower to be liberation. When it is reversed, the card means that we have not allowed ourselves to fully experience. Keeping control over our actions, we alleviate pain; at the same time, we do not release all of the inhibitory factors. Internally, the suffering continues, but in a critical, not radical way. To shield the Tower from the lightning is to become its own prisoner.

V. Corresponding Associations of The Tower Linestrider

Astrology: Aries;
Arithmetic: 16, 7;
Plants: garlic, heaths, morning glory, glossary yarrow.

More The Tower Cards from Famous Tarot Decks

1. The Tower Rider Waite Tarot

The Tower Rider Waite Tarot card represents a picture of a high tower at the top of a rugged mountain. Spotlights and flames are burning from the windows of this tower. We can see people jumping out of this card in despair, craving to escape from the destruction and chaos.

<< See More >> The Tower Rider Waite Tarot Card Meanings

2. The Tower Shadowscapes Tarot Deck

The Tower Shadowscapes Tarot brings a sudden and unexpected change. In one minute you have it all and then it disappears. Therefore, we cannot fully grasp the literal images of the Tower.

<< See More >> The Tower Shadowscapes Tarot Card Meanings