A rare time when time spent alone actually helps a relationship. It is a period when you can tell whether your feelings for someone are real or just loneliness, so looking back at what repeated in past relationships is better than rushing to find someone new. If you are together, a little distance keeps the relationship going longer.
A lamp lit alone
The Hermit: Card Meaning
The Hermit: Card Meaning
Reading It Upright and Reversed
The Hermit · Major Arcana No. IX
The Hermit is the card of a figure standing alone on a snowy ridge, holding up a lamp. Upright, it means a time to step back from the crowd for a while, look inward, and use the light found there to show the way to those who come after.
In the ninth picture an old man in a grey hooded cloak stands alone on a mountain ridge. Inside the lamp in his right hand shines a six-pointed star, and his left hand leans on a long staff. Below him there is only a snow-covered ridge, with no person or house anywhere in sight.
Notice that the lamp shines downward, not forward. It is not light meant to reach far away, but light for the ground at your feet and for the next step of whoever climbs behind you. That is why this card, paired with Virgo, speaks of careful attention rather than grand enlightenment.
If the Hermit appears, is it better not to see people?
It does not mean cutting ties; it means not leaving your decisions in other people’s mouths. If you asked many people about the same worry and became more confused because every answer differed, it is time to get out of that loop. Put your phone down for about an hour each day and sort out your thoughts alone, then ask only the people you truly need, only as much as you need.
The Hermit: Love
Upright
Reversed
The feelings are there, but you lock the door. To avoid getting hurt you keep postponing plans, and even the other person’s kindness feels like a burden. In a long relationship it shows as each of you shutting yourselves in separate rooms without a word. Waiting only for perfect timing means the other person tires and leaves first.
The Hermit: Money
Upright
A time better suited to reviewing money than earning it. Pull out every automatic payment and cancel what you do not use, and a larger amount than expected comes back to life. Decisions about putting money somewhere new are not too late after this month, once you have looked into them thoroughly.
Reversed
You are putting off facing your situation squarely. You go without checking your balance, or only roughly guess how much you owe. By not sharing your situation, you may even miss help you could have had. The moment you write the numbers on paper, a good part of the anxiety settles.
The Hermit: Work
Upright
A time to build your skills where others do not easily see. You prepare for a certification exam or are given a task that requires digging deep alone, and the results show not now but a few months later. You may also be asked to teach juniors or put together work manuals.
Reversed
Not sharing information with colleagues tangles the work. Trying to do it all alone means progress is not shared, and fearing you will look incompetent if you ask for help, you carry it to the very end. Spending a long time thinking about changing jobs without sending a single application also belongs here.
| Card | The Hermit — Major Arcana No. IX |
|---|---|
| Astrology · Element | Virgo |
| Major Arcana | It is number IX of the 22 cards, from 0 The Fool to 21 The World. Major cards point to the big currents you are going through these days rather than small day-to-day matters. |
| Upright Keywords | Looking within alone · reflection · becoming a lamp |
| Reversed Keywords | Isolation · avoidance · a retreat that missed its time |
The Hermit Upright
Looking within alone · reflection · becoming a lamp
The upright Hermit tells you not to look for the answer outside. If you have ever become more confused the more people you asked, now is such a time. Stop collecting advice and make time to be alone, and the answer you actually knew but did not want to accept will quietly surface.
The card’s message is also that stepping back is not avoidance. Declining a gathering, replying a few days late or keeping one day clear may look like slacking, but in this period it is the most useful choice. At the same time you are in a position to be someone’s lamp, so a flow of passing on what you went through to those who come after also arrives.
The Hermit Reversed
Isolation · avoidance · a retreat that missed its time
Reversed, the time spent withdrawn grows too long and the door locks altogether. At first you only needed room to collect your thoughts, but before you know it even incoming messages feel heavy, and after meeting someone it takes days to recover your energy. If time alone has started draining your strength instead of filling it, the direction has gone wrong.
Replacing action with worrying in your head is also common. A day passes on the feeling of having thought plenty, while the one call you needed to make never gets made. While you stay curled up, the moment to decide may slip by. Sending even a short hello to just one person before the day ends can turn the flow around.
Something to Try the Day This Card Appears
This evening, turn off every screen, stay alone for about thirty minutes, and write down the one thing you have put off most often lately. There is no need to strain for an answer; just write why you keep putting it off. A lamp does its job when it lights the ground at your feet, not somewhere far away.
Cards from Other Groups
Major Arcana: 22 Cards
The Magician
The High Priestess
The Empress
The Emperor
The Hierophant
The Lovers
The Chariot
Strength
The Hermit
Wheel of Fortune
Justice
The Hanged Man
Death
Temperance
The Devil
The Tower
The Star
The Moon
The Sun
Judgement
The World
The Fool
A card read on its own means something slightly different from one placed beside other cards. If something is on your mind these days, pick four cards to read on, and if you are curious about your inborn nature, open a Saju reading as well.