For example, the Lovers card, despite its name, doesn’t necessarily mean smooth sailing. Here’s everything you need to know about this card, including what it means for relationships, your professional life, and the challenges that could lie ahead for you. Blaire Porter and Britt June with tarot company Threads of Fate add, “The Lovers card represents relationships and choice—and though not exclusively, it is typically about romantic relationships.” When we pull this card, it indicates we may feel like external circumstances and relationships give us value. “If you took that particular person away, you are still a loved and loving individual. If you took the job away, you are still capable and good at what you do,” Vanderveldt notes. “It’s a process of choosing yourself first before engaging in a healthy relationship with anything outside yourself […] We’re being asked to fully accept ourselves as worthy.” In some cases this can mean knowing when to end a relationship that doesn’t serve you, or checking your own toxic or unhealthy behavior. As Vanderveldt adds, when you pull this card, “Ask yourself: How are you aligning with your values within your relationship? You’re finding a balance that’s right for the both of you; what does that look like?” The card asks you to explore what your relationship is bringing up for you and how you can generate that love from within, she says. “This is deep work,” Porter and June add. “It is shedding inherited patterns so we can have the life and relationships we truly desire, but we must first make those tough choices and leave the old ways.” “You are being asked to not act impulsively and to get to the heart of the matter,” they add. “If things are feeling imbalanced in your relationship, sit with why.” As Vanderveldt suggests, you can ask yourself, Where do your beliefs about love come from? How can you embrace vulnerability and honesty in relationship? As Vanderveldt explains, this card is a sign that “It’s time to align your actions out in the world with your inner needs and desires. Choose yourself, align with your core self, and don’t allow a number or a title to define who you are or show you how worthy you are.” “Go deep within to find what you truly want for yourself—outside of money or appearances—and find the values that you connect with to be your guiding force,” Vanderveldt says, adding that this is a time for self-compassion and reevaluation. For Vanderveldt, she likes to see newer decks go outside heteronormative contexts, as the cards have “evolved to shed light on the deep connections we make with others and the ways we approach intimacy of all kinds rather than just romantic or physical relationships.”
