16 – Tower – Thunderbolt
In essence, the Tower in tarot is based on the tower of Babylon, and perilous repercussions of unchecked and unprocessed knowledge.
In its deeper wisdom, it pertains to the ability of the mind in handling sound, and its limits of human real-time processing. Traditionally it has always been associated with a thunderbolt, and the lightning storms of yore. That is the nature of the cosmic energy it carries. It is that arduous process of overhaul. And the calmed flip-side of radical change.
The Tower, as the 16th card in the Major Arcana symbolises an awakening, a time when illusions are shattered and seemingly permanent structures are proved to be fallible and vulnerable. Whilst this can be distressing, there is however an the opportunity to build something stronger, and also more flexible, in accordance with one’s own values instead of the expectations or needs of others. This is also a flash of insight or even enlightenment, a breaking open of awareness which gives us a much broader view of life.
There is a powerful instinctual force emerging from the unconscious, stronger than the will’s efforts to repress it.
Although the Tower is always an overhaul, a tipping point of the body, there is often great insight to emerge and however its destruction, there is a fertile aftermath.